3_The English and Scottish popular ballads, volume 3 (of 5)

He dressed himself in skylight green,

His groomsmen all in red;

And every town as he rode through

They took him to be some king.

He rode and he rode until he came to fair Ellinter’s door;

He knocked so loud at the ring;

There was none so ready as fair Ellinter herself

To rise and let him in.

‘O what is the news, Lord Thomas?’ she said,

‘O what is the news to thee?’

‘I’ve come to invite you to my wedding,

And that is bad news to thee.’

‘God forbid, Lord Thomas,’ she said,

‘That any such thing should be!

For I should have been the bride myself,

And you should the bridegroom be.

‘O mother, O mother, come read this to me,

And regulate all as one,

Whether I shall go to Lord Thomas’ wed,

Or stay with you at home.’

‘Here you have one thousand friends,

Where there you would but one;

So I will invite you, with my blessing,

To stay with me at home.’

But she dressed herself in skylight red,

Her waiting-maids all in green,

And every town as she rode through

They took her to be some queen.

She rode and she rode till she came to Lord Thomas’s door;

She knocked so loud at the ring;

There was none so ready as Lord Thomas himself

To rise and let her in.

He took her by her lily-white hand,

He led her across the hall;

Sing, ‘Here are five and twenty gay maids,

She is the flower of you all.’

He took her by her lily-white hand,

He led her across the hall,

He sat her down in a big arm-chair,

And kissed her before them all.

The wedding was gotten, the table was set,

. . . . . . .

The first to sit down was Lord Thomas himself,

His bride, fair Ellinter, by his side.

‘Is this your bride, Lord Thomas?’ she said;

‘If this is your bride, Lord Thomas, she looks most wonderfully

dark,

When you could have gotten a fairer

As ever the sun shone on.’

‘O don’t you despise her,’ Lord Thomas said he,

‘O don’t you despise her to me;

Yes, I like the end of your little finger

Better than her whole body.’

The brown girl, having a little penknife,

And being both keen and sharp,

Right between the long and short ribs,

She pierced poor Ellinter’s heart.

‘O what is the matter, fair Ellinter,’ said he,

‘That you look so very dark,

When your cheeks used to have been so red and rosy

As ever the sun shined on?’

‘Are you blind, or don’t you see,

My heart-blood come trickling down to my knee?’

3^{1,2}. green _and_ red _should be interchanged: cf. 9_.

13, 14. _Rearranged._

15^1. said she.

181. Add to the French ballads, ‘La Délaissée,’ V. Smith, Romania, VII,

82; Legrand, Romania, X, 386, No 32; ‘La triste Noce,’ Thiriat,

Mélusine, I, 189; and to the Italian ballad, Nigra, No 20, p. 139,

‘Danze e Funerali.’

75. Lord Lovel.

P. 205 b. Other copies of ‘Den elskedes Død’ (‘Kjærestens Død’),

Kristensen, Skattegraveren, VII, 1, 2, Nos 1, 2; Bergström ock

Nordlander, in Nyare Bidrag, o. s. v., pp. 92, 100; and ‘Olof Adelen,’

p. 98, may be added, in which a linden grows from the common grave, with

two boughs which embrace.

Note. With the Scandinavian-German ballads belongs ‘Greven og lille

Lise,’ Kristensen, Skattegraveren, V, 20, No 14.

206, 512 b. To the southern ballads which have a partial resemblance may

be added: French, Beaurepaire, p. 52, Combes, Chants p. du Pays

castrais, p. 139, Arbaud, I, 117, Victor Smith, Romania, VII, 83, No.

32; Italian, Nigra, ‘La Sposa morta,’ No 17, p. 120 ff. (especially

#D#).

215. I ought not to have omitted the σήματα by which Ulysses convinces

Penelope, Odyssey, xxiii, 181–208; to which might be added those which

convince Laertes, xxiv, 328 ff. See also the romance of Don Bueso,

Duran, I, lxv:

¿Qué señas me dabas

Por ser conocida? et cét.

76. The Lass of Roch Royal.

II, 213. There is a version of this ballad in the Roxburghe collection,

III, 488, a folio slip without imprint, dated in the Museum Catalogue

1740. I was not aware of the existence of this copy till it was printed

by Mr Ebsworth in the Roxburghe Ballads, VI, 609. He puts the date of

issue _circa_ 1765. It is here given from the original. Compare #H#.

THE LASS OF OCRAM

I built my love a gallant ship,

And a ship of Northern fame,

And such a ship as I did build,

Sure there never was seen.

For her sides were of the beaten gold,

And the doors were of block-tin,

And sure such a ship as I built

There sure never was seen.

And as she was a sailing,

By herself all alone,

She spied a proud merchant-man,

Come plowing oer the main.

‘Thou fairest of all creatures

Under the heavens,’ said she,

‘I am the Lass of Ocram,

Seeking for Lord Gregory.’

‘If you are the Lass of Ocram,

As I take you for to be,

You must go to yonder island,

There Lord Gregory you’ll see.’

‘It rains upon my yellow locks,

And the dew falls on my skin;

Open the gates, Lord Gregory,

And let your true-love in!’

‘If you’re the Lass of Ocram,

As I take you not to be,

You must mention the three tokens

Which passd between you and me.’

‘Don’t you remember, Lord Gregory,

One night on my father’s hill,

With you I swaft my linen fine?

It was sore against my will.

‘For mine was of the Holland fine,

And yours but Scotch cloth;

For mine cost a guinea a yard,

And yours but five groats.’

‘If you are the Lass of Ocram,

As I think you not to be,

You must mention the second token

That passd between you and me.’

‘Don’t you remember, Lord Gregory,

One night in my father’s park,

We swaffed our two rings?

It was all in the dark.

‘For mine was of the beaten gold,

And yours was of block-tin;

And mine was true love without,

And yours all false within.’

‘If you are the Lass of Ocram,

As I take you not to be,

You must mention the third token

Which past between you and me.’

‘Don’t you remember, Lord Gregory,

One night in my father’s hall,

Where you stole my maidenhead?

Which was the worst of all.’

‘Begone, you base creature!

Begone from out of the hall!

Or else in the deep seas

You and your babe shall fall.’

‘Then who will shoe my bonny feet?

And who will close my hands?

And who will lace my waste so small,

Into a landen span?

‘And who will comb my yellow locks,

With a brown berry comb?

And who’s to be father of my child

If Lord Gregory is none?’

‘Let your brother shoe your bonny feet,

Let your sister close your hands,

Let your mother lace your waist so small,

Into a landen span.

‘Let your father comb your yellow locks,

With a brown berry comb,

And let God be father of your child,

For Lord Gregory is none.’

‘I dreamt a dream, dear mother,

I could wish to have it read;

I saw the Lass of Ocram

A floating on the flood.’

‘Lie still, my dearest son,

And take thy sweet rest;

It is not half an hour ago,

The maid passd this place.’

‘Ah! cursed be you, mother!

And cursed may you be,

That you did not awake me,

When the maid passd this way!

‘I will go down into some silent grove,

My sad moan for to make;

It is for the Lass of Ocram

My poor heart now will break.’

(4^1. Perhaps the reading was: The fairest, etc.)

Mr W. H. Babcock has printed a little ballad as sung in Virginia, in

which are two stanzas that belong to ‘The Lass of Roch Royal:’ The

Folk-Lore Journal, VII, 31.

‘Come along, come along, my pretty little miss,

Come along, come along,’ said he,

‘And seat yourself by me.’

‘Neither will I come, and neither sit down,

For I have not a moment’s time;

For I heard that you had a new sweetheart,

And your heart is no more mine.’

‘It never was, and it never shall be,

And it never was any such a thing;

For yonder she stands, in her own father’s garden,

The garden of the vine,

Mourning for her own true love,

Just like I’ve mourned for mine.’

I laid my head in a little closet-door,

To hear what my true love had to say,

So that I might know a little of his mind

Before he went away.

I laid my head on the side of his bed,

My arms across his breast;

I made him believe, for the fall of the year,

The sun rose in the west.

‘I’m going away, I’m coming back again,

If it is ten thousand miles;

It’s who will shoe your pretty little feet?

And who will glove your hand?

And who will kiss your red, rosy lips,

While I’m in a foreign land?’

‘My father will shoe my pretty little feet,

My mother glove my hand,

My babe will kiss my red, rosy lips,

While you’re in a foreign land.’

Mr James Mooney, of the Bureau of Ethnology, obtained two very similar

stanzas in the ‘Carolina Mountains.’

‘O who will shoe your feet, my dear?

Or who will glove your hands?

Or who will kiss your red rosy cheeks,

When I’m in the foreign lands?’

‘My father will shoe my feet, my dear,

My mother will glove my hands,

And you may kiss my red rosy cheeks

When you come from the foreign lands.’

78. The Unquiet Grave.

P. 234.

‘In Gipsy Tents,’ by Francis Hindes Groome, 1880, p. 141, as sung by

an old woman.

‘Cold blows the wind over my true love,

Cold blows the drops of rain;

I never, never had but one sweet-heart,

In the green wood he was slain.

‘But I’ll do as much for my true love

As any young girl can do;

I’ll sit and I’ll weep by his grave-side

For a twelvemonth and one day.’

When the twelvemonth’s end and one day was past,

This young man he arose:

‘What makes you weep by my grave-side

For twelve months and one day?’

‘Only one kiss from your lily cold lips,

One kiss is all I crave;

Only one kiss from your lily cold lips,

And return back to your grave.’

‘My lip is cold as the clay, sweet-heart,

My breath is earthly strong;

If you should have a kiss from my cold lip,

Your days will not be long.’

‘Go fetch me a note from the dungeon dark,

Cold water from a stone;

There I’ll sit and weep for my true love

For a twelvemonth and one day.

‘Go dig me a grave both long, wide and deep;

I will lay down in it and take one sleep,

For a twelvemonth and one day;

I will lay down in it and take a long sleep,

For a twelvemonth and a day.’

‘Cold blows the wind,’ Shropshire Folk-Lore, edited by Charlotte

Sophia Burne, 1883–86, p. 542; “sung by Jane Butler, Edgmond,

1870–80.”

‘Cold blows the wind over my true love,

Cold blow the drops of rain;

I never, never had but one true love,

And in Camvile he was slain.

‘I’ll do as much for my true love

As any young girl may;

I’ll sit and weep down by his grave

For twelve months and one day.’

But when twelve months were come and gone,

This young man he arose:

‘What makes you weep down by my grave?

I can’t take my repose.’

‘One kiss, one kiss, of your lily-white lips,

One kiss is all I crave;

One kiss, one kiss, of your lily-white lips,

And return back to your grave.’

‘My lips they are as cold as my clay,

My breath is heavy and strong;

If thou wast to kiss my lily-white lips,

Thy days would not be long.

‘O don’t you remember the garden-grove

Where we was used to walk?

Pluck the finest flower of them all,

‘Twill wither to a stalk.’

‘Go fetch me a nut from a dungeon deep,

And water from a stone,

And white milk from a maiden’s breast

[That babe bare never none].’

From the singing of a wandering minstrel and story-teller of the

parish of Cury, Cornwall. After the last stanza followed “a stormy

kind of duet between the maiden and her lover’s ghost, who tries to

persuade the maid to accompany him to the world of shadows.” Hunt,

Popular Romances of the West of England, First Series, 1865, p. xvi.

‘Cold blows the wind to-day, sweetheart,

Cold are the drops of rain;

The first truelove that ever I had

In the green wood he was slain.

‘’Twas down in the garden-green, sweetheart,

Where you and I did walk;

The fairest flower that in the garden grew

Is witherd to a stalk.

‘The stalk will bear no leaves, sweetheart,

The flowers will neer return,

And since my truelove is dead and gone,

What can I do but mourn?’

A twelvemonth and a day being gone,

The spirit rose and spoke:

. . . . . . .

‘My body is clay-cold, sweetheart,

My breath smells heavy and strong,

And if you kiss my lily-white lips

Your time will not be long.’

235 f. Add: Gaspé, Les anciens Canadiens, Québec, 1877, I, 220 ff.;

cited by Sébillot, Annuaire des Traditions populaires, 1887, p. 38 ff..

236. #A# 5, etc. So Nigra, ‘La Sposa morta,’ p. 122, No 17, #D# 12: ‘Mia

buca morta l’à odur di terra, ch’a l’era, viva, di roze e fiur.’

Little-Russian tale, Trudy, II, 416, No 122. A girl who is inconsolable

for the death of her mother is advised to hide herself in the church

after vespers on Thursday of the first week in Lent, and does so. At

midnight the bells ring, and a dead priest performs the service for a

congregation all of whom are dead. Among them is the girl’s godmother,

who bids her begone before her mother remarks her. But the mother has

already seen her daughter, and calls out, You here too? Weep no more for

me. My coffin and my grave are filled with your tears; wretched it is to

bathe in them! (W. W.) After this the mother’s behavior is not quite

what we should expect. Cf. the tale in Gaspé, just cited.

79. The Wife of Usher’s Well.

II, 238.

‘The Widow-Woman,’ Shropshire Folk-Lore, edited by Charlotte Sophia

Burne, 1883–86, p. 541; “taken down by Mr Hubert Smith, 24th March,

1883, from the recitation of an elderly fisherman at Bridgworth, who

could neither read nor write, and had learnt it some forty years

before from his grandmother in Corve Dale.”

“The West and South Shropshire folk say _far_ for _fair_.”

There was a widow-woman lived in far Scotland,

And in far Scotland she did live,

And all her cry was upon sweet Jesus,

Sweet Jesus so meek and mild.

Then Jesus arose one morning quite soon,

And arose one morning betime,

And away he went to far Scotland,

And to see what the good woman want.

And when he came to far Scotland,

. . . . . . .

Crying, What, O what, does the good woman want,

That is calling so much on me?

‘It’s you go rise up my three sons,

Their names, Joe, Peter, and John,

And put breath in their breast,

And clothing on their backs,

And immediately send them to far Scotland,

That their mother may take some rest.’

Then he went and rose up her three sons,

Their names, Joe, Peter, and John,

And did immediately send them to far Scotland,

That their mother may take some rest.

Then she made up a supper so neat,

As small, as small, as a yew-tree leaf,

But never one bit they could eat.

Then she made up a bed so soft,

The softest that ever was seen,

And the widow-woman and her three sons

They went to bed to sleep.

There they lay; about the middle of the night,

Bespeaks the youngest son:

‘The white cock he has crowed once,

The second has, so has the red.’

And then bespeaks the eldest son:

‘I think, I think it is high time

For the wicked to part from their dead,’

Then they laid [==led] her along a green road,

The greenest that ever was seen,

Until they came to some far chaperine,

Which was builded of lime and sand;

Until they came to some far chaperine,

Which was builded with lime and stone.

And then he opened the door so big,

And the door so very wide;

Said he to her three sons, Walk in!

But told her to stay outside.

‘Go back, go back!’ sweet Jesus replied,

‘Go back, go back!’ says he;

‘For thou hast nine days to repent

For the wickedness that thou hast done.’

Nine days then was past and gone,

And nine days then was spent,

Sweet Jesus called her once again,

And took her to heaven with him.

80. Old Robin of Portingale.

P. 240 a. ‘Sleep you, wake you.’ Add: ‘Young Beichan,’ No 53, #B# 5;

Duran, Romancero, I, 488, Nos 742, 743.

240 a, II, 513 a.

The very wicked knight Owen, after coming out of St Patrick’s Purgatory,

lay in his orisons fifteen days and nights before the high altar,

“And suþþe in is bare flech þe holi crois he nom,

And wende to þe holi lond, and holi mon bicom.”

Horstmann, Altengl. Legenden, 1875, p. 174, vv. 611–612; also p. 208, v.

697, and p. 209, v. 658. In a mediæval traveller’s tale the Abyssinians

are said to burn the cross in their children’s foreheads. “Vort wonent

da andere snoide kirsten in deme lande ind die heischent Ysini; wan man

yr kinder douft ind kirsten macht, dan broet der priester yn eyn cruce

vor dat houft.” Ein niederrheinischer Bericht über den Orient, ed.

Röhricht u. Meier, in Zacher’s Zeitschrift, XIX, 15. (G. L. K.)

83. Child Maurice.

P. 272. #F.#

Mr Macmath has found the edition of 1755, and has favored me with a

copy. Substitute for #F. a.#, p. 263: Gill Morice, An Ancient Scottish

Poem. Second Edition. Glasgow, Printed and sold by Robert and Andrew

Foulis, 1755. (Small 4º, 15 pages.) The copy mentioned p. 263 b, note,

is a reprint of this or of the first edition; it has but two variations

of reading. The deviations from the text of 1755 will be put in the list

of things to be corrected in the print.

84. Bonny Barbara Allen.

P. 276. In Miss Burne’s Shropshire Folk-Lore, 1883–86, p. 543, there is

a copy, taken from singing, which I must suppose to be derived

ultimately from print.

85. Lady Alice.

P. 279. The following version is printed by Mr G. R. Tomson in his

Ballads of the North Countrie, 1888, p. 434, from a MS. of Mrs Rider

Haggard.

GILES COLLINS AND LADY ANNICE

Giles Collins said to his own mother,

‘Mother, come bind up my head,

And send for the parson of our parish,

For to-morrow I shall be dead.

‘And if that I be dead,

As I verily believe I shall,

O bury me not in our churchyard,

But under Lady Annice’s wall.’

Lady Annice sat at her bower-window,

Mending of her night-coif,

When passing she saw as lovely a corpse

As ever she saw in her life.

‘Set down, set down, ye six tall men,

Set down upon the plain,

That I may kiss those clay-cold lips

I neer shall kiss again.

‘Set down, set down, ye six tall men,

That I may look thereon;

For to-morrow, before the cock it has crowd,

Giles Collins and I shall be one.

‘What had you at Giles Collins’s burying?

Very good ale and wine?

You shall have the same to-morrow night,

Much about the same time.’

Giles Collins died upon the eve,

This fair lady on the morrow;

Thus may you all now very well know

This couple died for sorrow.

Lt-Col. Prideaux has sent me this copy, from Fly-Leaves, London, John

Miller, 1854, Second Series, p. 98.

GILES COLLINS

Lady Annis she sat in her bay-window,

A-mending of her night-coif;

As she sat, she saw the handsomest corpse

That ever she saw in her life.

‘Who bear ye there, ye four tall men?

Who bear ye on your shouldyers?’

‘It is the body of Giles Collins,

An old true lovyer of yours.’

‘Set’n down, set’n down,’ Lady Annis she said,

‘Set’n down on the grass so trim;

Before the clock it strikes twelve this night,

My body shall lie beside him.’

Lady Annis then fitted on her night-coif,

Which fitted her wondrous well;

She then pierced her throat with a sharp-edgd knife,

As the four pall-bearers can tell.

Lady Annis was buried in the east church-yard,

Giles Collins was laid in the west,

And a lily grew out from Giles Collins’s grave

Which touched Lady Annis’s breast.

There blew a cold north-westerly wind,

And cut this lily in twain;

Which never there was seen before,

And it never will again.

89. Fause Foodrage.

P. 298 a. Add, ‘Sönnens hævn,’ Kristensen, Skattegraveren, IV, 113, No

284; a fragment.

90. Jellon Grame.

Pp. 303 b, 513 b. Marvellous growth, etc. Ormr Stórólfsson very early

attained to a great size, and at seven was a match for the strongest

men: Flateyjarbok, I, 521, Fornmanna Sögur, III, 205, cited by Bugge in

Paul u. Braune’s Beiträge, XII, 58. Wolfdietrich gains one man’s

strength every year, and amazes everybody in his infancy even.

Wolfdietrich A, ed. Amelung, sts 31, 38–41, 45, 233, 234, pp. 84, 85,

86, 108. (Some striking resemblances to Robert le Diable.) Cf. also

Wigalois, ed. Pfeiffer, 36, 2 f.,==Benecke, 1226 f.:

In einem jâre wuchs ez mêr

dan ein anderz in zwein tuo.

Elias (afterwards the Knight of the Swan), who is to avenge his mother,

astonishes by his rapid growth the old hermit who brings him up:

“A! Dieu! dist ly preudons, à qui est cest enfant?

Il est sy jouènes d’âge et s’a le corps sy grant:

S’il croist sy faitement, ce sera ung gaiant.”

Chevalier au Cygne, ed. Reiffenberg, vv. 960–963, I, 45. “The little

Malbrouk grew fast, and at seven years old he was as tall as a tall

man.” Webster, basque Legends, 2d ed., p. 78; Vinson, Folk-Lore du Pays

basque, p. 81. The Ynca Mayta Ccapac “a few months after his birth began

to talk, and at ten years of age fought valiantly and defeated his

enemies.” Markham, Narratives of the Rites and Laws of the Yncas,

Hakluyt Society, p. 83. A Tête-Rasée infant in four days grows to the

full size of man. Petitot, Traditions Indiennes du Canada Nord-Ouest,

pp. 241–243. (G. L. K.)

91. Fair Mary of Wallington.

P. 310. #Danish.# Another copy of ‘Malfreds Død,’ Kristensen’s

Skattegraveren, VI, 195, No 804.

93. Lamkin.

P. 320. The negroes of Dumfries, Prince William County, Virginia, have

this ballad, orally transmitted from the original Scottish settlers of

that region, with the stanza found in #F# (19) and #T# (15):

Mr Lammikin, Mr Lammikin,

oh, spare me my life,

And I’ll give you my daughter Betsy,

and she shall be your wife.

“They sang it to a monotonous measure.” (Mrs Dulany.)

94. Young Waters.

P. 343. By the kindness of Mr Macmath, I have now a copy of the original

edition.

Young Waters, an Ancient Scottish Poem, never before printed. Glasgow,

Printed and sold by Robert and Andrew Foulis, 1755. (Small 4º, 8 pages.)

The few differences of reading will be given with corrections to be made

in the print.

95. The Maid Freed from the Gallows.

P. 346. Mr Alfred Nutt has communicated to the Folk-Lore Journal, VI,

144, 1888, the outline of a ballad in which, as in some versions of the

European continent, the man has the place of the maid. But this may be a

modern turn to the story, arising from the disposition to mitigate a

tragic tale. The ballad was obtained “from a relative of Dr Birbeck

Hill’s, in whose family it is traditional. Mother, father, and brethren

all refuse him aid, but his sweetheart is kinder, and buys him off.” For

the burden see #C# 6, which, as well as #B# 12, might better have been

printed as such.

‘Hold up, hold up your hands so high!

Hold up your hands so high!

For I think I see my own mother coming

Oer yonder stile to me.

Oh the briars, the prickly briars,

They prick my heart full sore;

If ever I get free from the gallows-tree,

I’[ll] never get there any more.

‘Oh mother hast thou any gold for me,

Any money to buy me free,

To save my body from the cold clay ground,

And my head from the gallows-tree?’

‘Oh no, I have no gold for thee,

No money to buy thee free,

For I have come to see thee hanged,

And hangëd thou shalt be.’

Struppa’s text of ‘Scibilia Nobili’ is repeated in Salomone-Marino’s

Leggende p. siciliane in Poesia, p. 160, No 29. The editor supplies

defects and gives some varying readings from another version, in which

Scibilia is the love, not the wife, of a cavalier.—Mango, Calabria, in

Archivio, I, 394, No 75 (wife).—‘La Prigioniera,’ Giannini, No 25, p.

195, two copies, reduces the story to four or five stanzas. The sequel,

No 26, p. 197, is likely to have been originally an independent ballad.

It is attached to ‘Scibilia Nobili,’ but is found separately in Bernoni,

XI, No 3, ‘La Figlia snaturata,’ Finamore, Archivio, I, 212, ‘Catarine.’

347 b. ‘Frísa vísa’ is reprinted by Hammershaimb, Færøsk Anthologi, p.

268, No 34. The editor expressly says that the ballad is used as a

children’s game, like the English #F#. So also are Danish #A#, and a

Magyar ballad of like purport, to be mentioned presently.

348 b. #Danish.# #A#, in Kristensen’s Skattegraveren, ‘Jomfruens

udløsning,’ II, 49, No 279, 1884; #B#, III, 5, No 3, 1885. From

tradition. Both versions agree with the Swedish in all important points,

and the language of #B# points to a Swedish derivation.

349 a. Ransom for maid refused by father, mother, brother, sister, and

paid by lover: Little-Russian, Golovatsky, I, 50, No 11; II, 245, No 7.

(W. W.)

349 b, 514 a. Man redeemed by maid when abandoned by his own blood:

Little-Russian, Golovatsky, I, 250, No 26; Servian, Vuk, III, 547, No

83; Magyar-Croat, Kurelac, p. 254, No 61, p. 352, No 96. (W. W.)

In a Slovak ballad in Kollár, Národnie Zpiewanky, II, 13, translated by

Herrmann, Ethnologische Mittheilungen, col. 42 f., John, in prison,

writes to his father to ransom him; the father asks how much would have

to be paid; four hundred pieces of gold and as many of silver; the

father replies that he _has not_ so much, and his son must perish. An

ineffectual letter to mother, brother, sister, follows; then one to his

sweetheart. She brings a long rope, with which he is to let himself down

from his dungeon. If the rope proves too short, he is to add his long

hair (cf. I, 40 b, line 2, 486 b); and if it be still too short, he may

light upon her shoulders. John escapes. Nearly the same is the Polish

ballad translated in Waldbrühl’s Balalaika, which is referred to II, 350