P. 1. There is a ballad of ‘Bertram, the Bauld Archer’ in Pitcairn’s
MSS, III, 51; printed in Maidment’s Scotish Ballads and Songs, 1859, p.
46. Pitcairn derived it from Mrs McCorquodale, Stirling, a farmer’s
wife, who remembered it “to have been sung by her grandmother, a woman
above eighty years old, who stated that she had it from an old woman,
her aunt.” The reciter herself was above sixty-five, and had “first
heard it when a little girl.” Nevertheless, Bertram is fustian, of a
sort all too familiar in the last century. The story, excepting perhaps
the first stanza, is put into the mouth of Bertram’s mistress, _à la_
Gilderoy. The bauld archer has gone to the forest for to mak a robberie.
The king has made proclamation that he will give five hunder merk for
Bertram’s life. John o Shoumacnair (Stronmaknair, Maidment) proposes to
his billies to kill Bertram and get the money. They busk themselves in
hodden gray, ‘like to friers o low degree,’ present themselves to
Bertram and ask a boon of him, which Bertram grants without inquiry.
While they are parleying, Shoumacnair drives his dirk into Bertram’s
back. But, though he swirls wi the straik, Bertram draws his awsome
bran, kills ane, wounds twa, and then his stalwart, gallant soul takes
its flight to heaven.
2b. Braid. “This version [‘Johnie of Braidisbank,’ I] was taken down by
Motherwell and me from the recitation of Mr James Knox, land-surveyor at
Tipperlinne, near Edinburgh, in the month of May, 1824, when we met him
in the good town of Paisley. At 17 a tradition is mentioned which
assigns Braid to have been the scene of this woeful hunting. Mr Knox is
the authority for this tradition. Braid is in the neighborhood of
Tipperlinne.” Note by Mr P. A. Ramsay in a copy of the Minstrelsy which
had belonged to Motherwell. (W. Macmath.)
Wolves in Scotland. “It is usually said that the species was extirpated
about 1680 by Sir Ewen Cameron of Lochiel, but the tradition to that
effect appears to be true only of Sir Ewen’s own district of western
Invernessshire.” The _very_ last wolf may have been killed in 1743. R.
Chambers, Domestic Annals of Scotland, III, 690.
7. #F# was made up from several copies, one of which was the following,
‘John o Cockielaw,’ in Scott’s youthful handwriting, inserted, as No 3,
at the beginning of a MS. volume, in small folio, containing a number of
prose pieces, and beginning with excerpts from Law’s Memorials.
Abbotsford Library, L. 2.
1
Johnny got up in a May morning,
Calld for water to wash his hands:
‘Gar louse to me my good gray dogs
That are tied with iron bands.’
2
When Johnny’s mother got word o that,
For grief she has lain down:
‘O Johnny, for my benison,
I red you bide at hame!’
3
He’s putten on his black velvet,
Likewise his London brown,
And he’s awa to Durrisdeer,
To hunt the dun deer down.
4
Johnny shot, and the dun deer lap,
And he wounded her on the side;
Between the water and the brae,
There he laid her pride.
5
He’s taken out the liver o her,
And likewise sae the lungs,
And he has made a’ his dogs to feast
As they had been earl’s sons.
6
They eat sae much o the venison,
And drank sae much of the blood,
That they a’ then lay down and slept,
And slept as they had been dead.
7
And bye there cam a silly ald man,
And an ill death might he die!
And he’s awa to the seven forresters,
As fast as he can drie.
8
‘As I cam down by Merriemas,
And down aboon the scroggs,
The bonniest boy that ever I saw
Lay sleeping amang his doggs.
9
‘The shirt that was upon his back
Was of the holland fine,
The cravat that was about his neck
Was of the cambrick lawn.
10
‘The coat that was upon his back
Was of the London brown,
The doublet . . . .
Was of the Lincome twine.’
11
Out and spak the first forrester,
That was a forrester our them a’;
If this be John o Cockielaw,
Nae nearer him we’ll draw.
12
Then out and spak the sixth,
That was . forrester amang them a’;
If this is John o Cockielaw,
Nearer to him we’ll draw.
13
Johnny shot six of the forresters,
And wounded the seventh, we say,
And set him on a milk-white steed
To carry tidings away.
4^4. Wi He there he (he _written in place of another word_). Wi He
_struck out_.
6^3. _Originally_, That they lay a’ them down.
7^2. _Originally_, And a silly ald man was he.
11^2. was hed. hed _struck out_.