+The Text+ is from _Lovely Jenny's Garland_, as given with emendations
by Professor Child. There is also a curiously perverted version in
Herd's manuscript, in which the verses require rearrangement before
becoming intelligible.
+The Story+ can be gathered from the version here given without much
difficulty. It turns on the marriage of Fair Mary, who is one of seven
sisters fated to die of their first child. Fair Mary seems to be a
fatalist, and, after vowing never to marry, accepts as her destiny the
hand of Sir William Fenwick of Wallington. Three-quarters of a year
later she sends to fair Pudlington for her mother. Her mother is much
affected at the news (st. 22), and goes to Wallington. Her daughter, in
travail, lays the blame on her, cuts open her side to give birth to an
heir, and dies.
In a Breton ballad Pontplancoat thrice marries a Marguerite, and each of
his three sons costs his mother her life.
In the Scottish ballad, a 'scope' is put in Mary's mouth when the
operation takes place. In the Breton ballad it is a silver spoon or a
silver ball. 'Scope,' or 'scobs' as it appears in Herd, means a gag, and
was apparently used to prevent her from crying out. But the silver spoon
and ball in the Breton ballad would appear to have been used for
Marguerite to bite on in her anguish, just as sailors chewed bullets
while being flogged.