The concluding verses of this ballad were inserted in the copy of
_Tamlane_, given to the public in the first edition of this work. They
are now restored to their proper place. Considering how very apt the
most accurate reciters are to patch up one ballad with verses from
another, the utmost caution cannot always avoid such errors.
A more sanguine antiquary than the editor might perhaps endeavour to
identify this poem, which is of undoubted antiquity, with the _"Broom
Broom on Hill,"_ mentioned by Lane, in his _Progress of Queen Elizabeth
into Warwickshire_, as forming part of Captain's Cox's collection,
so much envied by the black-letter antiquaries of the present
day.--_Dugdale's Warwickshire,_ p. 166. The same ballad is quoted by one
of the personages, in a "very mery and pythie comedie," called _"The
longer thou livest, the more fool thou art."_ See Ritson's Dissertation,
prefixed to _Ancient Songs,_ p. lx. "Brume brume on hill," is also
mentioned in the _Complayat of Scotland_. See Leyden's edition, p. 100.