Bluegrass Messengers

Professor Child and the Ballad
by Walter Morris Hart
PMLA, Vol. 21, No. 4 (1906), pp. 755-807

PUBLICATIONS
OF THE
Modern Language Association of America
1906
VOL. XXI, 4. NEW SERIES, VOL. XIV, 4.

XVII.-PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD

In the course of his insistence upon the necessity of a continued recognition of the popular ballad as a distinct literary type, Professor Gummere points out the value of a collection of Professor Child's critical remarks on the ballad and an attempt to determine their general drift.[1] Such is the purpose of the present paper.

Aside from the article in the Universal Cyclopcedia, Professor Child's comments are mere obiter dicta, based upon no underlying principle and forming no part of a set purpose. They are, therefore, not easy to classify; the attempt to reduce them to order can be only partially successful, and any arrangement must appear more or less arbitrary. Yet some arrangement
has seemed advisable and they have been roughly grouped under the following headings:

(1) Authorship and Transmission;
(2) Subject-Matter;
(3) Technique;
(4) A Comparison of the Ballads of 1857-1859 and The English and Scottish Popular Ballads of 1882-1898;
(5) A Collection of General Comments upon Specific Ballads;
(6) Summary


I.
In that article in the Universal Cyclopcedia which Professor Child "wished to be neither quoted nor regarded as final," [2] but which must here be combined with other tentative or fragmentary statements, he defined the popular ballad as "a distinct and very important species of poetry. Its historical and natural place," he said, "is anterior to the appearance of the poetry of art, to which it has formed a step, and by which it has been regularly displaced, and, in some cases, all but extinguished. Whenever a people in the course of its development reaches a certain intellectual and moral stage, it will feel an impulse to express itself, and the form of expression to which it is first impelled is, as is well known, not prose, but verse, and in fact narrative verse.
The condition of society in which a truly national or popular poetry appears explains the character of such poetry. It is a condition in which the people are not divided by political organization and book-culture into markedly distinct classes, in which consequently there is such community of ideas and feelings that the whole people form an individual.

Such poetry, accordingly, while it is in its essence an expression of our common human nature, and so of universal and
indestructible interest, will in each case be differenced by circumstances and idiosyncrasy. On the other hand, it will always be an expression of the mind and heart of the people as an individual, and never of the personality of individual men. The fuindamental characteristic of popular ballads is therefore the absence of subjectivity and of self-consciousness.

Though they do not 'write themselves,' as William Grimm has said, though a man and not a people has composed them, still the author counts for nothing, and it  is not by mere accident, but with the best reason, that they have come down to us anonymous. Hence, too, they are extremely difficult to imitate by the highly civilized modern man, and most of the attempts to reproduce this kind of poetry have been ridiculous failures.

"The primitive ballad, then, is popular, not in the sense of something arising from and suited to the lower orders of a people. As yet, no sharp distinction of high and low exists, in respect to knowledge, desires, and tastes. An increased civilization, and especially the introduction of book-culture, gradually gives rise to such a division; the poetry of art appears; the popular poetry is no longer relished by a portion of the people, and is abandoned to an uncultivated or not over-cultivated class-a constantly
diminishing number."

But "the popular ballad is not originally the product or the property of the lower orders of the people. Nothing, in fact, is more obvious than that many of the ballads of the now most refined nations had their origin in that class whose acts and fortunes they depict-the upper class though the growth of civilization has driven them from the memory of the highly polished and instructed, and has left them as an exclusive possession to the uneducated. The genuine popular ballad had its rise in a time when the distinctions since brought about by education and other circumstances had practically no existence. The vulgar
ballads of our day, the 'broadsides' which were printed in such large numbers in England and elsewhere in the sixteenth
century or later, belong to a different genus; they are products of a low kind of art, and most of them are, from a literary point of view, thoroughly despicable and worthless.

"Next it must be observed that ballads which have been handed down by long-repeated tradition have always departed considerably from their original form. If the transmission has been purely through the mouths of unlearned people, there is less probability of willful change, but once in the hands of professional singers there is no amount of change which they may not undergo. Last of all comes the modern editor, whose so-called improvements are more to be feared than the mischances of a thousand years. A very old ballad will often be found to have resolved itself in the course of what may be called its propagation into several distinct shapes, and each of these again to have received distinct modifications. When the fashion of verse has altered, we shall find a change of form as great as that in the Hildebrandslied, from alliteration without stanza to stanza with
rhyme. In all cases the language drifts insensibly from ancient forms, though not at the same rate with the language of every-day life. The professional ballad-singer or minstrel, whose sole object is to please the audience before him, will
alter, omit, or add, without scruple, and nothing is more common than to find different ballads blended together.

"There remains the very curious question of the origin of the resemblances which are found in the ballads of different nations, the recurrence of the same incidents or even of the same story, among races distinct in blood and history, and geographically far separated." It is not necessary to go back to a common ancestry to explain these resemblances." The incidents of many ballads are such as might occur anywhere and at any time; and with regard to agreements that can not be explained in this way we have only to remember that tales and songs were the chief social amusement of all classes of people in all the nations of Europe during the Middle Ages, and that new stories would be eagerly sought for by those whose business it was to
furnish this amusement, and be rapidly spread among the fraternity. A great effect was undoubtedly produced by the crusades, which both brought the chief European nations into closer intercourse and made them acquainted with the East, thus facilitating the interchange of stories and greatly enlarging the stock."

This account of authorship and transmission may be illustrated and supplemented by obiter dicta from The English and Scottish Popular Ballads. "The author counts for nothing;" the ballad is essentially anonymous: that Expliceth quod Rychard Sheale means merely that The Hunting of the Cheviot (162) "was of course part of his stock as minstrel; the supposition that he was the author is preposterous in the extreme." [3]

Ballads are at their best when " the transmission has been purely through the mouths of unlearned people," when they have come down by domestic tradition, through knitters and weavers. Glasgerion (67, B) " is mainly of good derivation (a poor old woman in Aberdeenshire)." [4] And " no Scottish ballads are superior in kind to those recited in the last century by Mrs Brown, of Falkland." [5] Yet even upon Mrs Brown printed literature may have had some influence: in Fause Foodrage (89), "the resemblance in the verse in A 31, 'The boy stared wild like a gray gosehawke,' to one in 'Hardyknute,' 'Norse een like gray
goss-hawk stared wild,' struck Sir Walter Scott as suspicious," and "it is quite possible that Mrs Brown may unconsciously have adopted this verse from the tiresome and affected Hardyknute, so much esteemed in her day."[6]
 
A literary treatment of a ballad theme may affect the traditional versions' of that ballad. In the case of Child Maurice (83) "the popularity of the play [Home's Douglas] seems to have given vogue to the ballad. The sophisticated copy passed into recitation, and may very likely have more or less infected those which were repeated from earlier tradition."[7] A whole ballad may even be completely derived from print, and yet, in the course of time, revert to the popular form. Of this same ballad, Child Maurice, "Mr Aytoun considers that E is only the copy printed in the middle of the last century purged, in the process of oral transmission, of what was not to the popular taste, 'and altered more.' There is no doubt that a copy learned from print may be transformed in this way, but it is certain that old tradition does not come to a stop when a ballad gets into print." [8]

Not only the possible influence of print is to be taken into account; much depends on the material to which the reciter was exposed and upon his selection. "It will not .. help the ballad [Young Bearwell (302)] much that it was not palmed off on Buchan in jest or otherwise, or even if it was learned from an old person by Mr Nicol in his youth. The intrinsic character of the ballad remains, and old people have sometimes burdened their memory with worthless things."[9] Editors were not the only interpolators; of The Twa Sisters (10), A, a, 11-13, need not have been written, but "might easily be extemporized by any
singer of sufficiently bad taste." [10] The varying memory of reciters, too, was a cause of unintentional change. Thus " Mrs Brown was not satisfied with A b [of Bonny Baby Livingston (222)], which Jamieson had taken down from her mouth, and after a short time she sent him A a.

The verbal differences are considerable. We need not suppose that Mrs Brown had heard two ' sets' or 'ways,' of which she blended the readings; the fact seems to be that, at the time when she recited to Jamieson, she was not in good condition to remember accurately." [11] In general, however, the folk memory is remarkable for its tenacity. "Most of the [Danish] versions [of Earl Brand (7)] from recitation
are wonderful examples and proofs of the fidelity with
which simple people 'report and hold' old tales: for, as the
editor has shown, verses which never had been printed, but
which are found in old manuscripts, are now met with in
recited copies; and these recited copies, again, have verses
that occur in no Danish print or manuscript, but which
nevertheless are found in Norwegian and Swedish recitations,
and, what is more striking, in Icelandic tradition of
two hundred years' standing." 2
The ballad does not remain in the possession of the simple
folk, or of reciters of Mrs Brown's instinctive good taste.
Its best fortune is then perhaps to fall into the hands of
children, like The Maid Freed From the Gallows (95),
of which " F had become a children's game, the last stage
of many old ballads."3 Again, "it is interesting to find
the ballad [The Twa Brothers (49)] still in the mouths of
children in American cities,-in the mouths of the poorest,
whose heritage these old things are." 4 Sir Hugh (155) in
the form of Little Harry Hughes and the Duke's Daughter,
was heard, says Mr Newell, "from a group of colored
children, in the streets of New York city," and traced "to
a little girl living in one of the cabins near Central Park." &
Less happy is the fate of the ballad when it falls into
the hands of professional singers,-the Minstrel Ballad is to
be considered presently,-or when it falls into the hands
of amateurs of various sorts, who corrupt and debase it.
Hind Etin (41) "has suffered severely by the accidents of
1 Iv, 231.
2
I, 89. See also the comment on Apollodorus and the Cretan fairy-tale,
I, 337, quoted, p. 774, below.
3 In, 346. 4 I, 435. 5 Quoted, Im, 254.
761
WALTER MORRIS HART.
tradition. A has been not simply damaged by passing
through low mouths, but has been worked over by low
hands. Something considerable has been lost from the story,
and fine romantic features, preserved in Norse and German
ballads, have been quite effaced." 1 Of The Clerk's Twa Sons
o Owsenford (72) "D has some amusing dashes of prose,
evidently of masculine origin. [Examples follow]. We
have here a strong contrast with both the blind-beggar and
the housemaid style of corruption; something suggesting the
attorney's clerk rather than the clerk of Owsenford, but at
least not mawkish." 2 The "blind beggar" is, of course,
Buchan's collector, and whether he or the editor was responsible
for the corruptions is not always clear. The blind
beggar himself, however, comes in for special condemnation
in the comment on The Bent Sae Brown (71): The introduction
and conclusion, and some incidental decorations, of
the Scottish ballad will not be found in the Norse, but are
an outcome of the invention and the piecing and shaping
of that humble but enterprising rhapsodist who has left his
trail over so large a part of Buchan's volumes." 3 In
Brown Robin (97) "the story undoubtedly stops at the right
point in A, with the escape of the two lovers to the wood.
The sequel in C is not at all beyond the inventive ability
of Buchan's blind beggar, and some other blind beggar may
have contrived the cane and the whale, the shooting and
the hanging, in B."4 As type of the housemaid style of
corruption may, perhaps, stand Lizie Lindsay (226). "Leezie
Lindsay from a maid-servant in Aberdeen," wrote Jamieson
to Scott of A b.5 And, "in his preface to B, Kinloch
remarks that the ballad is very popular in the North,
'and few milk-maids in that quarter but can chaunt it.'" 6
1I, 360. 2II, 173. 31, 170. 4 I, 368.
5 IV, 255, n. 6 Iv, 255.
762
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
"Ballads of this description [a young lord o the Hielands,
pretending that he is the son of an auld shepherd and an
auld dey, persuades a young lady of Edinburgh to fly with
him to the Ilighlands, where he at length reveals his
identity]-ballads of this description are peculiarly liable
to interpolation and debasement, and there are two passages,
each occurring in several versions, which we may, without
straining, set down to some plebeian improver." 1
Not mere corruption, but serving-man authorship, even,
is suggested for Tom Potts (109): "Such events [unequal
matches] would be celebrated only by fellows of the yeoman
or of the foot-boy, and surely in the present case the
minstrel was not much above the estate of the serving-man.
Lord Jockey's reckless liberality throughout, and Lord
Phoenix's in the end, is a mark of the serving-man's ideal
nobleman." 2 Again as mere corrupter, rather than author,
appears the ostler in one version of Bewick and Graham
(211). In the 1833 edition of The Border Minstrelsy "deficiencies
were partly supplied and some different readings
adopted 'from a copy obtained by the recitation of an ostler
in Carlisle.'" g "is shown by internal evidence to be the
ostler's copy. Both copies [g and h] were indisputably
derived from print, though h may have passed through
several mouths. g agrees with b-f closely as to minute
points of phraseology which it is difficult to believe that a
reciter would have retained. It looks more like an immediate,
though faulty, transcript from print." 3 Contrasting styles
are suggested in the comment on The Broomfield Hill (43):
"The editor [of the broadside, "differing as to four or five
words only from F"] remarks that A is evidently taken
from F; from which it is clear that the pungent buckishness
of the broadside does not necessarily make an impression.
IV, 256. Cf. B 10, D 10, E 19; F 11; E 10, F 6.
2 I, 441. Iv, 144.
763
WALTER MORRIS HART.
A smells of the broom; F suggests the groom." Perhaps
not to be classed with these non-professional corrupters or
interpolaters is the bankelsinger who is responsible for one
of the German versions of Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight
(4): "M smacks decidedly of the bankelsanger, and has
an appropriate moral at the tail: animi index cauda! "2
Perhaps he is to be regarded as a humble sort of minstrel;
to the comments on this class we may now turn our
attention.
It does not appear from Professor Child's remarks whether
he thought of the minstrel as composing his ballads,-or
making them over,-orally or in writing. Perhaps we are
to suppose that he followed now one method, now the
other. Rychard Sheale may be supposed to have affixed his
" expliceth" to his written copy of Chevy Chase; yet it is
" quod Rychard Sheale" as if the manuscript had been
written by another from his singing. But whether the
ballad passed through the minstrel's mouth or through his
hands, it received some peculiar and characteristic modifications.
Thus The Boy and the MJantle (29), King Arthur
and King Cornwall (30), and The Marriage of Sir Gawain
(31) "are clearly not of the same rise, and not meant for
the same ears, as those which go before. They would come
down by professional rather than by domestic tradition,
through minstrels rather than knitters and weavers. They
suit the hall better than the bower, the tavern or public
square better than the cottage, and would not go to the
spinning-wheel at all. An exceedingly good piece of minstrelsy
'The Boy and the Mantle' is, too; much livelier
than most of the numerous variations on the somewhat
overhandled theme."3 Crow and Pie (111), likewise, "is
not a purely popular ballad, but rather of that kind which,
1 I, 391.
764
2
I, 34. 3 I, 257.
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
for convenience, may be called the minstrel-ballad. It has,
however, popular features, and markedly in stanzas 13, 14,"1
-the damsel's demanding the name of the man who has
wronged her, a feature found in The Bonny Hind (50) and
its continental parallels.2 The term minstrel may, perhaps,
be more loosely used in the passage which describes The
Rising in the North (175) as "the work of a loyal but not
unsympathetic minstrel;"3 in the statement concerning
Northumberland Betrayed by Douglas (176), that "the balladminstrel
acquaints us with circumstances concerning the
surrender of Northumberland ;"4 and in the statement to
the effect that, in the case of Tom Potts (109), "the minstrel
was not much above the estate of the serving-man." 5
We may now attempt to construct an account of the
vicissitudes to which the ballad was subject when, in
the course of transmission, it sometimes found its way into
writing and into print. Version B of The Bunting of the
Cheviot (162) "is a striking but by no means a solitary
example of the impairment which an old ballad would suffer
when written over for the broadside press. This very
seriously enfeebled edition was in circulation throughout the
seventeenth century, and much sung .... despite its length.
It is declared by Addison, in his appreciative and tasteful
critique .... to be the favorite ballad of the common
people of England." 6 Similarly, in the case of Sir Andrew
Barton (167), "a collation of A and B will show how
ballads were retrenched and marred in the process of preparing
them for the vulgar press."7 "B begins vilely, but
does not go on so ill. The forty merchants coming 'with
fifty sail' to King Henry on a mountain top .... requires
to be taken indulgently." Though a broadside differs
II, 478. 2Cf. I, 444 f. 3 II , 403. 4III, 410.
5
II, 441. 6 1, 305. 7
I, 334. 8 IIn, 334, n.
765
WALTER MORRIS HART.
widely from a true ballad, it is not to be supposed that,-
at least in the examples included by Professor Child,-
some general traits or special features peculiar to the popular
or traditional matter or manner did not survive. Thus,
although the ballad of The Twa Knights (268) "can have
had no currency in Scotland, and perhaps was known only
through print," yet "a similar one is strictly traditional in
Greece, and widely dispersed, both on the mainland and
among the islands."1 Again, there are two broadsides of
King John and the Bishop (45), which Professor Child does
not include, "both inferior even to B, and in a far less
popular style." 2 There are, then, degrees of departure
from the popular style. There are degrees of departure from
the popular matter, also, and the broadside preserves sometimes
but a single popular feature. Version M of Young
Beichan (53) "was probably a broadside or stall copy, and
is certainly of that quality, but preserves a very ancient
traditional feature." 3 The broadside version of The Broomfield
Hill (43) is distinguished by a "pungent buckishness,"
which is not found in A, and which " suggests the groom." 4
A broadside may itself become tradition. The English
version of Lord Thomas and Fair Annet (73) " is a broadside
of Charles the Second's time. . . . This copy has
become traditional in Scotland and Ireland. The Scottish
traditional copy .... is far superior, and one of the most
beautiful of our ballads, and indeed of all ballads." 5 The
tradition lives, even after a ballad has found its way into
print, and may influence and modify later versions of the
printed form. Of Prince Ileathen (104) "the fragment A
.... is partly explained by B, which is no doubt some
stall-copy, reshaped from tradition." 6 Of The Baffled Knight
1 v, 21. 44. , I, 455. I, 391.
5
II, 180. 6 1, 424.
766
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
(112) "E is, in all probability, a broadside copy modified by
tradition." In origin, in any case, the broadsides in The
English and Scottish Popular Ballads are popular.2 "There
is a Scottish ballad [similar to The Baffled Knight] in which
the tables are turned.... This, as being of comparatively
recent, and not of popular, but of low literary origin, cannot
be admitted here." 3
"Last of all comes the modern editor," and from Professor
Child's comments and skilful undoing of much of
their work one might put together fairly complete accounts
of the methods of Percy, Scott, Jamieson, Buchan, and the
rest. We are concerned, however, not so much with the
editors as with the results of their editing, with the kinds
of change that the ballad suffered in their hands. It was
often lengthened, in many cases by the combination of
several versions. Thus Scott's version of Tam Lin (39, I),
"as he himself states, was compounded of the Museum
copy, Riddell's, Herd's, and ' several recitals from tradition.'
4 Of this use of materials from recitation examples
are very numerous. Ballads were lengthened also by the
interpolation of new stanzas. After Scott's edition, in
the M%instrelsoyf, The Twa Sisters (10), "Jamieson followed
.... with a tolerably faithful, though not, as he says,
verbatim,5 publication of his copy of Mrs Brown's -ballad,
1 I, 480.
2The comparison of broadsides with traditional versions is instructive.
See I, A, a, b, c; 10, A, a; 45, B; 53, L, M; 73, D; 104, B, 112, E (and
II, 491); 110, A; 145, C; 151; 152; 153; 162, B; 167, B; 268. Much
of the later Robin Hood poetry looks like " char-work done for the petty
press" (III, 42). Robin Hood Rescuing Will Stutly (141) "is a ballad made
for print, with little of the traditional in the matter and nothing in the
style" (III, 185).
8 I, 480. 4 I, 335.
5 Jamieson was not always precise in the account he gave of the
changes he made in his texts" (iv, 255). Cf. also I, 138.
767
WALTER MORRIS HART.
somewhat marred, too, by acknowledged interpolations."'
King Henry (32) was increased by Jamieson's interpolations
from twenty-two to thirty-four stanzas.2 Scott's version of
Fair Annie (62, A) "was obtained 'chiefly from the recitation
of an old woman,' but we are not informed who supplied
the rest. Herd's fragment, D, furnished stanzas 2-6, 12,
17, 19. A doubt may be hazarded whether stanzas 8-10
came from the old woman." 3 Interpolation and combination
are here both illustrated. Scott's later edition of Tam
Lin (39) "was corrupted with eleven new stanzas, which
are not simply somewhat of a modern cast as to diction, as
Scott remarks, but of a grossly modern invention, and
as unlike popular verse as anything can be." 4 Of his
version of Jellon Grame (90) Scott says: "'Some verses
are apparently modernized."' "The only very important
difference between Scott's version and Mrs Brown's is its
having four stanzas of its own, the four before the last two,
which are evidently not simply modernized, but modern." 5
But the editor did not merely combine or interpolate;
more vaguely, he "improved." Version E of The Fair
Flower of Northumberland (9), "a traditional version from
the English border, has unfortunately been improved by
some literary pen." 6 Or he " retouched," 7 or " altered," 8
or " emended." Scott confesses to some emendation of
Kinmont Willy (186); "it is to be suspected that a great
deal more emendation was done than the mangling of
reciters rendered absolutely necessary. One would like, for
example, to see stanzas 10-12 and 31 in their mangled
condition." 9 In general, no changes or additions are "in
so glaring contrast with the groundwork as literary emenda-
1 Stanzas 20, 21, 27, etc. I, 119. Cf. II, 83.
2 I, 297. 3 I, 63 f. 4I, 335. 5I1, 302.
61, 112. 7IV, 5. 8I, 138. 9 I, 472.
768
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
tions of traditional ballads."' " Variations," also, are to be
noted: inaccuracies in The Fire of Frendraught (196) are
acknowledged by Motherwell; "the implication is, or should
be, that these variations are of editorial origin." 2 Of Sweet
William's Ghost (77, A and B), " Percy remarks that the
concluding stanza seems modern. There can be no doubt
that both that and the one before it are modern; but, to the
extent of Margaret's dying on her lover's grave, they are
very likely to represent original verses not remembered
in form." 3
Certain general results of transmission, of whatever kind,
are to be noted. As a ballad passes from one country to
another the nationality of the hero may be changed. In
Hugh Spencer's Feats in France (158) "Hugh is naturally
turned into a Scotsman in the Scottish version, C." 4 The
hero's name is not more stable than his nationality. "In
the course of transmission [of John Thomson and the Turk
(266)], as has ever been the wont, names were changed, and
also some subordinate circumstances." 5 Again, " the actual
name of the hero of a ballad affords hardly a presumption
as to who was originally the hero." 6 Even the part that
he plays the hero may exchange with another character.
"Robin Hood's rescue of Little John, in Guy of Gisborne,
after quarrelling with him on a fanciful provocation, is a
partial offset for Little John's heart-stirring generosity in
this ballad. [Robin Hood and the Mionk (119).] We have
already had several cases of ballads in which the principal
actors exchange parts." 7 The ballad, again, is not constant
in its attachment to one locality, and "the topography of
traditional ballads frequently presents difficulties, both because
it is liable to be changed, wholly, or, what is more
1 n, 428. 2 Iv, 39. Cf. II, 317.
5 v, 2. 6 II, 19.
3 I, 226.
7 III, 96.
IIn, 276.
769
WALTER MORRIS HART.
embarrassing, partially, to suit a locality to which a ballad
has been transported, and again because unfamiliar names,
when not exchanged, are exposed to corruption."' Thus,
"in the ballad which follows this [Rare Willie Drowned in
Yarrow (215)], a western variety of the same story, Willie
is drowned in the Clyde." 2
The corruption of names is but one phase of the change
to which all unfamiliar ballad diction is exposed. "At
every stage of oral transmission we must suppose that some
accidental variations from what was delivered would be introduced,
and occasionally some wilful variations. Memory
will fail at times; at times the listener will hear amiss,
or will hot understand, and a perversion of sense will ensue,
or absolute nonsense,-nonsense which will be servilely
repeated, and which repetition may make more gross ....
Learned words do not occur in ballads; still an old native
word will be in the same danger of metamorphosis. But,
though unfamiliarity naturally ends in corruption, mishearing
may have the like effect where the original phrase is in
no way at fault....
" It must be borne in mind, however, that as to nonsense
the burden of proof rests always upon the expositor. His
personal inability to dispose of a reading is not conclusive;
his convictions may be strong, but patience and caution are
his part and self-restraint as to conjectures."
3
In transmission, then, and even in the best of it, the
ballad ordinarily fares but ill, "departs from the original
form," becomes less typically ballad; and, generally speaking,
the older it is, the earlier it is caught and fixed in print,
the better. Professor Child has thus special praise for those
Robin Hood ballads which "have come down to us in
comparatively ancient form." 4 Robin Hood's Death (120, B)
2 IV, 178. 3 V, 309.
770
I Iv, 156. 4 III, 42.
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
is "in the fine old strain."' Robin Hood and the Beggar
(134, II), "by far the best of the Robin Hood ballads of
the secondary, so to speak cyclic, period," is "a composition
of some antiquity," 2 Thomas Rymer (37) "is an entirely
popular ballad as to style, and must be of considerable age." 3
One is not to expect in a late or modern ballad the excellence
found in an early or ancient one. Robin Hood's Chase
(146) "is a well-conceived ballad, and only needs to be
older."4 Walter Lesly (296) is "a late, but life-like and
spirited ballad." The Hunting of the Cheviot (162, B) "is
a striking .... example of the impairment which an old
ballad would suffer when written over for the broadside
press." 6 Version M of Young Beichan (53) " was probably
a broadside or stall copy, and is certainly of that quality,
but preserves a very ancient traditional feature."7 The
"ridiculous ballad" of John Thomson and the Turk (266)
finds a place in the collection because it is "a seedling from
an ancient and very notable story." 8 The Knight's Ghost
(265) "has not a perceptible globule of old blood in it, yet
it has had the distinction of being more than once translated
as a specimen of Scottish popular ballads." 9 Scott's later
edition of Tam Lin (39) "was corrupted with eleven new
stanzas, which are not simply somewhat of a modern cast as
to diction, as Scott remarks, but of a grossly modern invention,
and as unlike popular verse as anything can be." 10
Scott's version of Jellon Grame (90) has four stanzas of its
own, "which are evidently not simply modernized, but
modern." n Certain stanzas in version B b of Archie o Cawfield
(188) "are indifferent modern stuff."12 The "modern
1 II, 103. 2 III, 159. 3
, 320. 4 II, 206.
v, 168. 6 III 305. I, 455. 8 V, 1.
9 iv, 437. 0 I, 335. n n, 302. 12 III, 486.
2
771
WALTER MORRIS HART.
ballad" on the subject of The Heir of Linne (267) is "an
inexpressibly pitiable ditty."
Certain counterfeits, imitations, or "spurious" ballads,
wholly or almost wholly the work of editors or modern
writers, are included in Professor Child's collection. Robin
Hood and the Tinker (127) is a "contemptible imitation of
imitations." 2 Buchan's version of Young Waters (94) is,
for the most part, "a counterfeit of the lowest description.
Nevertheless it is given in an appendix; for much the same
reason that thieves are photographed." Young Ronald
(304) is an example of the "spurious" ballad, and the
reasons for its inclusion are given at some length. "If any
lover of ballads should feel his understanding insulted by
the presentation of such a piece as this, I can have no
quarrel with him. There is certainly much in it that is
exasperating. ... In this and not a very few other cases,
I have suppressed disgust, and admitted an actually worthless
and manifestly-at least in part-spurious ballad,
because of a remote possibility that it might contain relics,
or be a debased representative, of something genuine and
better. Such was the advice of my lamented friend, Grundtvig,
in more instances than those in which I have brought
myself to defer to his judgment."4 For the same reason
is included The Laidley Worm of Spindleston Heughs: "This
composition of Mr. Lamb's-for nearly every line of it is
his 5-is not only based on popular tradition, but evidently
preserves some small fragments of a popular ballad, and for
this reason is given in an Appendix." 6
lv, 12. Cf. also I, 35, Iv, 10, 142, 401, for passages condemned as
' modern."
2
II, 140. 3II, 342. 4v, 182.
5 Communicated by the Rev. Mr Lamb to Hutchinson " with this harmless
preamble: 'a song 500 years old, made by the old Mountain Bard,
Duncan Frasier, living on Cheviot, A. D. 1270."'
6
I, 308.
772
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
II.
From what has been said it is clear that, as a rule, the
ballad is at its best, is most typically ballad, when its
subject-matter is of purely popular origin. The Gest and
the earliest Robin Hood ballads " are among the best of all
ballads," and Robin Hood "is absolutely a creation of the
popular muse. The earliest mention we have of him is as
the subject of ballads." "Absolutely a creation of the
popular muse" would seem to imply that the ballad is
not,-or that these ballads at least are not,-based either
upon a formless popular tradition or upon definite prose
tales. Local traditions follow the ballad, as attempts to
explain it; they do not supply the story. " In places where
a ballad has once been known, the story will often be
remembered after the verses have been wholly or partly
forgotten, and the ballad will be resolved into a prose tale,
retaining, perhaps, some scraps of verse, and not infrequently
taking up new matter, or blending with other traditions.
Naturally enough, a ballad and an equivalent tale sometimes
exist side by side." 2
The existence of foreign traditional parallels is one evidence
of popular origin. The Bent Sae Brown (71) has close
resemblances with Norse ballads; "but the very homeliness
of the Scottish ballad precludes any suspicion beyond tampering
with tradition. The silliness and fulsome vulgarity of
Buchan's versions often enough make one wince or sicken.
. . . But such correspondences with foreign ballads as we
witness in the present case are evidence of a genuine traditional
foundation."3 Less complete, yet even more striking,
are the foreign versions of the theme of Tam Lin (39).
2I, 46; examples follow.
773
1 III, 42. 3 I, 170, n.
WALTER MORRIS HART.
"This fine ballad stands by itself, and is not, as might have
been expected, found in possession of any people but the
Scottish. Yet it has connections, through the principal
feature in the story, the retransformation of Tam Lin, with
Greek popular tradition older than Homer." 1 "We come
.... surprisingly near to the principal event of the Scottish
ballad in a Cretan fairy-tale .... [1820-1830]." And
this "Cretan tale does not differ from the one repeated by
Apollodorus from earlier writers a couple of thousand years
ago more than two versions of a story gathered from oral
tradition in these days are apt to do. Whether it has come
down to our time from mouth to mouth through twenty-five
centuries or more, or whether, having died out of the popular
memory, it was reintroduced through literature, is a
question that cannot be decided with certainty; but there
will be nothing unlikely in the former supposition to those
who bear in mind the tenacity of tradition among people
who have never known books." 2 The Suffolk Miracle (272)
has "impressive and beautiful"3 European parallels, and
therefore finds a place in Professor Child's collection.
Other debased or counterfeit or spurious ballads are present
for the same reason, or because, like Tam Lin, they contain
some purely popular or traditional feature. Certain features
are expressly declared to be popular or to be common in
ballads; among these are the quibbling oaths and the
unbosoming oneself to an oven or stove, in The Lord of
Lorn and the False Steward (271);4 the miraculous harvest
in The Carnal and the Crane (55);5 the childbirth in the
wood in Leesome Brand (15) and in Rose the Red and White
Lily (103) ;6 the presence of three ladies, "that the youngest
may be preferred to the others;" the unpardonable "offence
1I, 336. 2I, 337. s , 59. 4v, 48.
5 1, 7. 6I, 416.
774
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
given by not asking a brother's assent to his sister's
marriage" in The Cruel Brother (11);1 the testament in
The Cruel Brother, Lord Randal, Edward, etc.;2 the riddles
in Riddles Wisely Expounded (1), etc. ; and certain stanzas
in Crow and Pie (111).4 "Heroic sentiment" is a characteristic
of the earlier Robin Hood ballads; in the later it is
gone.5 It may be that in his appreciation of certain other
features Professor Child is thinking not merely of their
excellence but of their peculiarly popular quality as well.
Thus he speaks of "the fine trait of the ringing of the
bells without men's hands, and the reading of the books
without man's tongue," 6 in Sir Hugh (155); and thinks
that "perhaps the original conception [of The Twa Sisters
(10)] was the simple and beautiful one which we find in
English B and both the Icelandic ballads, that the king's
harper, or the girl's lover, takes three locks of her yellow
hair to string his harp with." 7
The ballad does not always go to ancient tradition, or
draw upon the stock of popular themes and motives; occasionally,
in more modern times, it tells the story of some
actual occurrence; it is based on fact. But the balladist
feels himself under no obligation of loyalty to the fact. "A
strict accordance with history should not be expected, and
indeed would be almost a ground of suspicion [" or a pure
accident "]. Ballad singers and their hearers would be as
indifferent to the facts as the readers of ballads are now; it
is only editors who feel bound to look closely into such
matters." 8 In Johnie Armstrong (169) "the ballads treat
facts with the customary freedom and improve upon them
greatly."9 Bonny John Seton (198) "is accurate as to the
date, not commonly a good sign for such things." 10 "A ballad
I, 142. Examples, I, 143. 3 , 1. 4JI, 478.
III, 159. 6 II, 235. I, 121. 8II, 19.
9 m, 366. 0 Iv, 51.
775
WALTER MORRIS HART.
taken down some four hundred years after the event will
be apt to retain very little of sober history." 1 Yet, in the
case of The Hunting of the Cheviot (162), at least, "the ballad
can scarcely be a deliberate fiction. The singer is not a
critical historian, but he supposes himself to be dealing with
facts; he may be partial to his countrymen, but he has no
doubt that he is treating of a real event." 2 Part of The
Earl of Westmoreland (177) "has an historical substratum,
though details are incorrect." 3 In Northumberland Betrayed
by Douglas (176) "the ballad-minstrel acquaints us with
circumstances concerning the surrender of Northumberland
which are not known to any of the historians."4 Local
tradition would seem to be even less authentic than the
ballad; "in such cases" as The Coble o Cargill (242) it
"seldom means more than a theory which people have
formed to explain a preexisting ballad." 5
We have already seen how a ballad derived from print
tends to revert to the popular form; the same tendency is
evident in the ballad derived from a romance. Of Gude
Wallace (157) "Blind Harry's Wallace .... is clearly the
source." " But the portions of Blind Harry's poem out of
which these ballads were made were perhaps themselves
composed from older ballads, and the restitution of the
lyrical form may have given us something not altogether
unlike what was sung in the fifteenth, or even the fourteenth,
century." 6 Thomas Rymer (37) is derived from the romance,
yet it is "an entirely popular ballad as to style." 7 These
are the only cases where Professor Child admits without
question the derivation of a ballad from a romance; in other
cases, where ballad and romance tell the same story, he
insists that the possibility of the priority of the ballad must
1 I, 317.
5 IV, 359.
2II, 304. 8III, 417.
6 II, 265 f. 7 I, 320.
4 I. 410,
776
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
be considered. Thus the ballad of Hind Horn (17) has
close affinity with the later English romance, but no filiation.
"And were filiation to be accepted, there would
remain the question of priority. It is often assumed, without
a misgiving, that oral tradition must needs be younger than
anythifig that was committed to writing some centuries ago;
but this requires in each case to be made out; there is
certainly no antecedent probability of that kind." Fair
Annie (62) is not derived from the lay; they "have a
common source, which lies further back, and too far for us
to find." 2 In Gil Brenton (5) "the artifice of substituting
waiting-woman for bride has been thought to be derived
from the romance of Tristan .... Grundtvig truly remarks
that a borrowing by the romance from the popular ballad is
as probable a supposition as the converse."3 The ballad
does sometimes go to the romance for details. Thus, in
The Earl of Westmoreland (177) "what follows [stanza 15]
is pure fancy work, or rather an imitation of stale old
romance." 4 The Kitchie-Boy (252) is a modern adaptation
of King Horn, but, "in the particular of the hero's having
his choice of two women, it is more like the gest of 'King
Horn,' or 'Horn Childe and Maiden Rimnild;' but an
independent invention of the Spanish lady is not beyond the
humble ability of the composer of ' The Kitchie-Boy.'"5
In the "worthless and manifestly-at least in part-spurious
ballad" of Young Ronald (304), "the nicking with nay and
the giant are borrowed from romances." 6 Though the Gest,
finally, "as to all important considerations, is eminently
original, absolutely so as to the conception of Robin Hood,
some traits and incidents, as might be expected, are taken
from what we may call the general stock of mediaeval
I, 193.
5
Iv, 401.
211, 67. 3I, 67.
6V, 182.
4 III, 417.
777
WALTER MORRIS HART.
fiction."' Thus "Robin Hood will not dine until he has
some guest that can pay handsomely for his entertainment.
. . . This habit of Robin's seems to be a humorous imitation
of King Arthur, who in numerous romances will not
dine till some adventure presents itself." 2
Not only from ancient tradition, from fact, from romance
or the sources of romance may the ballad derive its subjectmatter;
it may also turn back upon itself, and as late ballads
counterfeit or imitate the style of earlier ones, so late ballads
go to earlier ones for their subject-matter as well. Thus
The Battle of Otterburn (161) "is likely to have been
modernized from .... a predecessor." 3 Part of The King's
Disguise, and Friendship with Robin Hood (151) "is a loose
paraphrase, with omissions, of the seventh and eighth fits of
the Gest." 4 The Brown Girl (295) "recalls ' Lord Thomas
and Fair Annet,' 'Sweet William's Ghost,' Clerk Saunders,'
'The Unquiet Grave,' 'Bonny Barbara Allen,' and has
something of all of them .... Still it is not deliberately
and mechanically patched together (as are some
pieces in Part VIII), and in the point of the proud and
unrelenting character of the Brown Girl it is original."5
"Deliberately and mechanically put together" were the
pieces of Part VIII which follow. Auld Matrons (249)
"was made by someone who had acquintance with the
first fit of 'Adam Bell.' The anonymous 'old wife' becomes
'auld Matrons;' Inglewood, Ringlewood. The conclusion
is in imitation of the rescues in Robin Hood ballads."6
Henry Martyn (250) " must have sprung from the ashes of
'Andrew Barton,' of which name Henry Martyn would be
no extraordinary corruption."7 The Kitchie-Boy (252) is
"a modern 'adaptation' of ' King Horn'.... from which
1 I, 49 f.
5 , 166.
2 III, 51. III, 293.
6Iv, 391. 'v, 393.
4 II, 220.
778
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
A 33, 34, B 47, D 7, 8, are taken outright."' The first
half of Willie's Fatal Visit (255) "is a medley of 'Sweet
William's Ghost,' 'Clerk Saunders,' and 'The Grey Cock,' 2
Of Broughty Wa's (258), " Stanza 9, as it runs in b, is a reminiscence
of 'Bonny Baby Livingston,' and 13 recalls 'Child
Waters,' or 'The Knight and the Shepherd's Daughter.'"3
A large part of The New-Slain Knight (263) "is imitated or
taken outright from very well known ballads." 4 Like some
of these later ballads the Gest of Robyn Ilode goes back to
earlier ballads for its subject-matter. "The Gest is a popular
epic, composed from several ballads by a poet of a
thoroughly congenial spirit. No one of the ballads from
which it was made up is extant in a separate shape, and
some portions of the story may have been of the compiler's
own invention. The decoying of the sheriff into the wood,
stanzas 181-204, is of the same derivation as the last part
of Robin Hood and the Potter, No 121, Little John and
Robin Hood exchanging parts; the conclusion, 451-56, is of
the same source as Robin Hood's Death, No 120." 5 Some
of the Middle-English forms "may be relics of the ballads
from which this little epic was made up; or the whole poem
may have been put together as early as 1400, or before." 6
It is noteworthy that the Gest was composed from, not of,
several ballads; it was not made up of unchanged ballads,
"deliberately and mechanically put together."
The motives or features characteristic of subject-matter
derived from pure popular tradition have already been
noted; we may now note those traits which Professor Child
declares or implies to be not characteristic of such subjectmatter.
Extravagance would seem to be one of these: the
extravagance of Hughie Grame (191, A, 16) "it is to be
'iv, 401.
6 I1, 49.
iv, 415. 8 iv, 423.
6 III, 40.
4iv, 434.
779
WALTER MORRIS HART.
hoped is a corruption." 1 In Mary Hamilton (173) "there
are not a few spurious passages. Among these are the
extravagance of the queen's bursting in the door, F 8;
the platitude,2 of menial stamp, that the child, if saved,
might have been an honor to the mother, D 10, L 3, 0 4,"3
Exaggeration is another non-traditional trait: "It is but
the natural course of exaggeration that the shepherd, having
beaten Robin Hood, should beat Little John. This is
descending low enough, but we do not see the bottom of this
kind of balladry here" 4 [Robin Hood and the Shepherd
(165)]. Robin Hood and Queen Katherine (145) is "a very
pleasant ballad, with all the exaggeration." 5 The true ballad
is not prosaic: in Fause Foodrage (89) " the .... king kills
his successful rival on his wedding-day. According to the
prosaic, not at all ballad-like, and evidently corrupted
account in A, there is a rebellion of nobles four months after
the marriage, and a certain False Foodrage takes it upon
himself to kill the king." 6 The true ballad is not overrefined:
in The Braes of Yarrow (214, C, 2) "the brothers
have taken offence because their sister was not regarded as
his equal by her husband, which is perhaps too much of a
refinement for ballads, and may be a perversion."7 The
true ballad is not cynical: The Twa Corbies sounds "something
like a cynical variation of the tender little English
ballad," 8 and it is not printed as a ballad in Professor Child's
collection. The true ballad is not sophisticated: it was the
influence of the play, Home's Douglas, that gave vogue to
the ballad, Child Maurice (83), and "the sophisticated copy
passed into recitation." The true ballad is not sentimental:
in Mary Hamilton (173), "there are not a few spurious
Iv, 10. 2 Cf. In, 225. III, 381.
4 I, 165. III, 197. 6II, 296.
7 iv, 161. 8I, 253. Cf. also In, 258. 9II, 263.
780
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
passages," among them, "the sentimentality of H 3, 16." 1
Jamieson published Child Waters (63, B a) with "the addition
of three sentimental stanzas to make Burd Ellen die
just as her enduring all things is to be rewarded."2 The
true ballad does not append a moral: a German version of
Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight (4) " smacks decidedly of the
bankelsanger, and has an appropriate moral at the tail."3
A certain degree of probability or naturalness is to be
expected of the true ballad story: in Jellon Grame (90),
"one day, when the boy asks why his mother does not take
him home, Jellon Grame (very unnaturally) answers, I slew
her, and there she lies: upon which the boy sends an arrow
through him." 4
Finally, the plot of the true ballad is not
trite. In Child Owlet (291) "thle chain of gold in the first
stanza and the penknife below the bed in the fourth have a
false ring, and the story is of the tritest. The ballad seems
at best to be a late one, and is perhaps mere imitation."5
II.
It is clear that to Professor Child's mind it was necessary
that the ballad should tell a story. " The word ballad in
English signifies a narrative song, a short tale in lyric
verse." 6 Thus the English versions of Geordie (209) are
said to be mere 'goodnights,' whereas " the Scottish ballads
have a proper story, with a beginning, middle, and end, and
(save one late copy), a good end, and they are most certainly
.... independent of the English."7 Dugall Quin (294) is
a "little ballad, which has barely story enough to be so
III, 381. 2 II, 83. 3I, 34. II, 302. v, 156f.
6 Universal Cyclopcedia, "Ballad Poetry." The lyrical element is of
equal importance; see p. 790, below.
7 IV, 126.
781
WALTER MORRIS HART.
called."' To the "English 'ditty' (not a traditional ballad)
.... there is very little story." 2
Necessary as the story is, however, it is seldom completely
told in the ballad; something is left to the hearers' imagination.
Sometimes the close of the story is omitted: " it is
not said (except in the spurious portions of E) that the lady
was carried back by her husband, but this may perhaps be
inferred from his hanging the gypsies. In D and K we
are left uncertain as to her disposition."3 Transitions are
usually abrupt,-" abrupt even for a ballad" in Willie's
Lady (6) from stanza 33 to stanza 34.4 Jamieson, in printing
The Bonny Birdy (82), introduced several stanzas 'to fill
up chasms.' "But the chasms, such as they are, are easily
leapt by the imagination, and Jamieson's interpolations are
mere bridges of carpenter's work." 5 Of Sir Patrick Spens
(58), "Percy's version [A] remains, poetically, the best. It
may be a fragment, but the imagination easily supplies all
that may be wanting; and if more of the story, or the whole,
be told in H, the half is better 6 than the whole." 7 These
abrupt transitions do not, then, result in incoherence, which
accompanies corruption and is a sign of degeneracy. Thus
The Carnal and the Crane (55) "had obviously been transmitted
from mouth to mouth before it was fixed in its
present incoherent and corrupted form by print." 8 Young
Bearwell (302) is "one of not a few flimsy and unjointed
ballads found in Buchan's volumes, the like of which is
hardly to be found elsewhere." 9 After an attempt to make
the story of The White Fisher (264) hang together, Professor
Iv, 165.
2 Iv, 192. [The Broom of Cowdenknows (217)].
Iv, 63. [The Gypsie Laddie (200)].
4 I, 82. II, 260.
6 Surely better as ballad. Cf. p. 796, below.
7 I, 18. 8 II 7. v, 178.
782
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
Child concludes: "( But we need not trouble ourselves much
to make these counterfeits reasonable. Those who utter
them rely confidently upon our taking folly and jargon as
the marks of genuineness."' Coherence, on the contrary,
is a characteristic of the true ballad, an important phase of
ballad excellence. " I am persuaded that there was an older
and better copy of this ballad [Bewick and Graham (211)]
than those which are extant. The story is so well composed,
proportion is so well kept, on the whole, that it is reasonable
to suppose that certain passages (as stanzas 3, 4, 50) may
have suffered some injury."2 Introductions, not closely
connected with the ballad story, are not characteristic.
"The narrator in the Ever Green poem reports at second
hand: as he is walking, he meets a man who, upon request,
tells him the beginning and the end. Both pieces have
nearly the same first line. The borrowing was more probably
on the part of the ballad, for a popular ballad would be
likely to tell its tale without preliminaries." 3
Brevity is a characteristic of the true ballad, and it may
be, in this respect, profitably contrasted with Buchan's
versions. Version C of Brown Adam (98) "has the usual
marks of Buchan's copies, great length, vulgarity, and such
extravagance and absurdity as are found in stanzas 23, 26,
29." 4
"Buchan, who may generally be relied upon to
produce a longer ballad than anybody else, has 'Young
Waters' in thirty-nine stanzas, 'the only complete version
which he had ever met.' " His version of The Gay Goshawk
(96, G) is "vilely dilated and debased," 6 and that of
Jellon Grame (90, C) "has nearly the same incidents as B,
diluted and vulgarized in almost twice as many verses." 7
The action is seldom carefully localized: the compiler of
1iv, 435. iv, 145. 3IIr, 317. 4 I, 373.
51n, 342. 6II, 355. 7 II, 302.
783
WALTER MORRIS HART.
A Gest of Robyn Hode was careless of geography.1 The
New England copy of Archie o Cawfield (188, F) "naturally
enough, names no places." "The route in C is not described2
there is no reason, if they start from Cafield (see 23), why
they should cross the Annan, the town being on the eastern
side. All difficulties are escaped in D by giving no names." 2
The attention given to the setting in some of the Robin
Hood ballads is, then, exceptional. Of Robin Hood and the
Monk (119), "the landscape background of the first two
stanzas has often been praised, and its beauty will never
pall. It may be called landscape or prelude, for both
eyes and ears are addressed, and several others of these
woodland ballads have a like symphony or setting: Adam
Bell, Robin Hood and the Potter, Guy of Gisborne, even
the much later ballad of The Noble Fisherman. It is
to be observed that the story of the outlaw Fulk Fitz
Warine, which has other traits in common with Robin
Hood ballads, begins somewhat after the same fashion." 3
In dealing with the supernatural the way of the true
ballad is to omit description or explanation. In James
Harris (243), "to explain the eery personality and proceedings
of the ship-master, E-G, with a sort of vulgar
rationalism, turn him into the devil.... D (probably by
the fortunate accident of being a fragment) leaves us to put
our own construction upon the weird seaman; and, though
it retains the homely ship-carpenter, is on the whole the
most satisfactory of all the versions." 4 In Johnie Scot (99)
"the champion is described in A 31 as a gurious (grugous,
gruous?) ghost; in H 27 as a greecy (frightful) ghost; in
L 18 he is a fearsome sight, with three women's spans
between his brows and three yards between his shoulders;
in the Abbotsford copy of A, 29, 30, a grisly sight, with a
2
IIm, 486. III, 95.
784
1 III, 51. 4 IV, 362.
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
span between his eyes, between his shoulders three and
three, and Johnie scarcely reaching his knee. These points
are probably taken from another and later ballad, which is
perhaps an imitation, and might almost be called a parody,
of Johnie Soot." Ghosts, though not thought sufficiently
strange to demand special treatment, should, nevertheless,
"have a fair reason for walking. ... In popular fictions,
the motive for their leaving the grave is to ask back plighted
troth, to be relieved from the inconveniences caused by the
excessive grief of the living, to put a stop to the abuse of
children by stepmothers, to repair an injustice done in the
flesh, to fulfil a promise; at the least, to announce the
visitant's death." 2
Turning now from technique,-from treatment of plot,
of setting, of the supernatural,-to style in the narrower
sense, we find that the comments are again largely in the
way of pointing out flaws, or traits which are not characteristic
of the true ballad, and which are due to the peculiar
conditions of ballad transmission. From such negative
comments may be inferred, again, the stylistic marks of the
true ballad. Thus, in the first place, ballad style is artless
and homely. In Andrew Lammie (233):
Her bloom was like the springing flower
That hails the rosy morning,
With innocence and graceful mein
Her beauteous form adorning.
and
'No kind of vice eer staind my life,
Or hurt my virgin honour;
My youthful heart was won by love,
But death will me exoner' (C, 2, 42).
are " not homely enough."
3 Moreover,
3IV, 301, n.
785
1 I, 378. 2v, 59.
WALTER MORRIS HART.
'At Fyvie's yetts there grows a flower,
It grows baith braid and bonny;
There's a daisie in the midst o it,
And it's ca'd by Andrew Lammie' (A, 1.).
"the mystical verses with which A and B begin are also not
quite artless."1 The ninth stanza of The New-Slain Knight
(263) "is pretty, but not quite artless." 2 In the true ballad
the conceit is out of place. Scott's version (C) of Thomas
Rymer (37) closes with two satirical stanzas not popular in
style. "'The repugnance of Thomas to be debarred the
use of falsehood when he should find it convenient,' may
have, as Scott says, 'a comic effect,' but is, for a ballad, a
miserable conceit." 3 In The Mother's Malison (216), A 81-2,
C 101-2,
Make me your wrack as I come back,
But spare me as I go,
the conceit (from Martial) "does not overwell suit a popular
ballad." 4 The literary manner is thus to be contrasted with
the popular. In Edward (13) "the word 'brand,' in the
first stanza, is possibly more literary than popular; further
than this the language is entirely fit." 5 Of Earl Brand (7)
"A a has suffered less from literary revision than ....
A c." 6 This revision may be illustrated by the following
stanza:
To a maiden true he'll give his hand,
To the king's daughter o fair England,
To a prize that was won by a slain brother's hand,
which c substitutes for a 32:
This has not been the death o ane,
But it's been that of fair seventeen.
Of The Fair Flower of Northumberland (9) " E, a traditional
'1 v, 301, n.
4 Iv, 186.
3 I, 320, n.
6I, 88.
786
2 IV, 434.
6 I, 167.
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
version from the English border, has unfortunately been
improved by some literary pen."' These improvements
consist in part of descriptions of the lady's states of mind; 2
for example:
To think of the prisoner her heart was sore,
Her love it was much but her pity was more.
The words that he said on her fond heart smote,
She knew not in sooth if she lived or not.
She looked to his face, and it kythed so unkind
That her fast coming tears soon rendered her blind.
(Sts. 3, 9, 10.)
Jamie Telfer (190) "was retouched for the Border Minstrelsy,
nobody can say how much. The 36th stanza is in Hardyknute
style."
3
Of Hughie Grame (191), B, 3, 8, " are obviously, as Cromek
says, the work of Burns, and the same is true of 103-4." 4
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men (106), an "English broadside,
which may be reasonably believed to be formed upon
a predecessor in the popular style,5 was given in Percy's
Reliques, . . ,'from a written copy containing some improvements
(perhaps modern ones).' These improvements are
execrable in style and in matter, so far as there is new
matter, but not in so glaring contrast with the groundwork
as literary emendations of traditional ballads." 6 Such contrast
is found in the " hack-rhymester lines" in Bewvik and
Graham (211, 73, 192), which are "not up to the mark of
the general style." 7 Similarly, King Henry (32) "as pub-
II, 112. 2 [The true ballad has little to say of mental states.]
3 iv, 5. The stanza reads:
But he's taen aff his gude steel cap,
And thrice he's waved it in the air;
The Dinlay snaw was neer mair white
Nor the lyart locks of Harden's hair.
4 Iv, 10. 5II, 430. 6 I, 428. Iv, 145.
3
787
WALTER MORRIS HART.
lished by Jamieson .... is increased by interpolation to
thirty-four stanzas [from twenty]. 'The interpolations will
be found enclosed in brackets,' but a painful contrast of
style of itself distinguishes them." 1 Editorial changes are,
however, in some cases confined to slight verbal variations,
where the contrast is less evident or painful.2
Yet, in spite of its artless, homely, and non-literary style,
the ballad is not without conventions of its own. Most
striking of these is the use of "commonplaces" or passages
which recur in many ballads, like:
When bells were rung and mass was sung,
And a' men bound to bed;
or,
O whan he came to broken briggs
He bent his bow and swam,
An whan he came to the green grass growin
He slackd his shoone and ran.3
Another convention is the complete repetition of the
message by the messenger. Thus in Fair Mary of Wallington
(91, A) "the stanza which should convey .... part of
the message is wanting, but may be confidently supplied
from the errand-boy's repetition." 4 Another form of repetition
occurs in the narration of similar incidents by different
ballads. "There is a general resemblance between the
rescue of Robin Hood in stanzas 61-81 and that of William
of Cloudesly in Adam Bell, 56-94, and the precaution
suggested by Much in the eighth stanza corresponds to the
warning given by Adam in the eighth stanza' of the other
ballad. There is a verbal agreement in stanzas 71 of the
first and 66 of the second. Such agreements or repetitions
are numerous in the Robin Hood ballads, and in other
traditional ballads, where similar situations occur." 5
1I, 297. 2 Cf. II, 83, 317; Iv, 39.
See the Index of Matters and Literature, v, 474 f.
4 II, 309, n. 5III, 96.
788
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
In the course of degeneration, ballads retain, but distort,
the commonplace. Thus in Lord Thomas and Lady Margaret
(261) "B 143 4 is a commonplace, which, in inferior traditional
ballads, is often, as here, an out-of-place. B 15, 16
is another commonplace, of the silly sort."' "Hacknied
commonplaces " occur in Auld lMatrons (249), stanzas 2-5; 2
"frippery commonplaces," in The White Fisher (264), stanzas
2, 7, 8, 12.3
Turning now to the emotional qualities of ballad style,
we find that the ghost ballad, in spite (or perhaps because)
of the absence of special treatment noted above, is, at its
best, "impressive." The scene at the grave in Sweet
William's Ghost (77 C 11-13) " may be judged grotesque,
but is not trivial or unimpressive. These verses may be
supposed not to have belonged to the earliest form of the
ballad, and one does not miss them from A, but they cannot
be an accretion of modern date." 4 In The Wife of Usher's
Well (79) "there is no indication that the sons come back to
forbid obstinate grief, as the dead often do. But supplying
a motive would add nothing to the impressiveness of these
verses. Nothing that we have is more profoundly affecting."
5 The Suffolk Miracle (272) is to be contrasted with
the continental versions, "one of the most remarkable tales
and one of the most impressive and beautiful ballads of the
European continent." 6 Bewick and Graham (211), in spite
of certain defects, "is a fine-spirited ballad as it stands, and
very infectious." 7 Walter Lesly (296) is "a late, but lifelike
and spirited ballad." 8 The Weeee ee Man (38) is an
"extremely airy and sparkling little ballad." 9Andrew
Lammie (233) "is a homely ditty, but the gentleness and
fidelity of Annie under the brutal behavior of her family are
genuinely pathetic, and justify the remarkable popularity
1 Iv, 426. 2 Iv, 391. 3 IV, 435. 4 II, 227. 5 I, 238.
6 v 59. 7 v, 145. 8 v, 168. 9 I, 329.
789
WALTER MORRIS HART.
which the ballad has enjoyed in the north of Scotland."'
Contrasted with the cynical Twa Corbies of Scott's Minstrelsy
is The Three Ravens (26), a "tender little English ballad." 2
In the Gest: "Nothing was ever more felicitously told, even
in the best dit or fabliau, than the 'process' of Our Lady's
repaying the money which had been lent on her security.
Robin's slyly significant welcome to the monk upon learning
that he is of Saint Mary Abbey, his professed anxiety
that Our Lady is wroth with him because she has not sent
him his pay, John's comfortable suggestion that perhaps the
monk has brought it, Robin's incidental explanation of
the little business in which the Virgin was a party, and
request to see the silver in case the monk has come upon
her affair, are beautiful touches of humor, and so delicate
that it is all but brutal to point them out." 3 The tales
which are cited as parallels to Queen Eleanor's Confession
(156) all "have the cynical Oriental character, and, to a
healthy taste, are far surpassed by the innocuous humor of
the English ballad."4 While we need not question the
substantial genuineness of Fause Foodrage (89), "we must
admit that the form in which we have received it is an
enfeebled one, without much flavor or color." 5 The Suffolk
Miracle (272) preserves the story only in a "blurred,
enfeebled, and disfigured shape." 6 Version B of the Cheviot
(162) is "very seriously enfeebled."7
The lyrical quality,-the fact that the ballad was made to
be sung,-must not be lost sight of. "Fair Annie's fortunes
have not only been charmingly sung, as here [in the ballad
of Fair Annie (62)]; they have also been exquisitely told
in a favorite lay of Marie de France."8 The superior
lyrical quality of The Bonny Birdy (82) " makes up for its
inferiority [to Little Musgrave (81)] as a story, so that on
1 iv, 301.
5 II, 296.
2 I, 253. III, 53.
6 V, 59. 7 II, 305.
4 II, 258.
8 II, 67.
790
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
the whole it cannot be prized much lower than the noble
English ballad."' Thus lyrical quality is to be regarded
as no less significant than plot as a trait of the true ballad.
The Queen of Elfan's Nourice (40), " after the nature of the
best popular ballad, forces you to chant and will not be
read." 2 Even The Jolly Pindar of Wakefield (124) "is
thoroughly lyrical, . . . and was pretty well sung to pieces
before it ever was printed."3 "It is not .... always easy
to say whether an isolated stanza belonged to a ballad or
a song ;" 4 and Professor Child speaks even of the whole
of Bessy Bell and Mary Gray (201) as "this little ballad,
or song." 5 Of Lord Lovel (75) he says: " It can scarcely
be too often repeated that such ballads as this were meant
only to be sung, not at all to be recited.... 'Lord Lovel'
is especially one of those which, for their due effect, require
the support of a melody, and almost equally the comment
of a burden. No burden is preserved in the case of ' Lord
Lovel,' but we are not to infer that there never was one.
The burden, which is at least as important as the instrumental
accompaniment of modern songs, sometimes, in
these little tragedies, foreshadows calamity from the outset,
sometimes .... is a cheerful-sounding formula, which in
the upshot enhances by contrast the gloom of the conclusion.
'A simple but life-like story, supported by the burden and
the air, these are the means by which such old romances
seek to produce an impression.'" 6 The Elfin Knight (2 A)
"is the only example, so far as I remember, which our
ballads afford of a burden of this kind, one that is of
greater extent than the stanza with which it was sung,
though this kind of burden seems to have been common
enough with old songs and carols." 7
1 I, 260. I, 358. 3 lI, 129.
4v, 201. 5 Iv, 75. 6 II, 204, n.
71, 7. See the foot-note for Professor Child's longest discussion of the
burden.
791
WALTER MORRIS HART.
IV.
The English and Scottish Popular Ballads of 1882-1898
has naturally superseded the English and Scottish Ballads of
1857-1859, and Professor Child himself shared the general
tendency to underestimate the real value of the earlier collection.
It was of course made on a different plan; its limits
were not so clearly defined, and it did not attempt to give
every version of every known ballad. Many of the sources,
moreover, were not yet open. One is, then, surprised to
find that, of the three hundred and five ballads printed in
the later collection, only ninety are new; and these are, for
the most part, unimportant additions to the body of ballad
literature. They are distributed as follows: 15 in volume
I, 16 in ii, 11 in IIn, 25 in Iv, 23 in v. Thus 59 of the
90 occur in the last three volumes; of these there is not one
of first importance. Of the remaining 31 not more than 10
can be regarded as really valuable additions, though such
an estimate must of necessity be based more or less upon
personal impression. Some of these were already accessible,
in Buchan's versions, or elsewhere: Willie's Lyke- Wake (25),
Lizie Wan (51), The King's Dochter Lady Jean (52), Brown
Robyn's Confession (57), Fair Mary of Waltington (91). These,
doubtless, were omitted because of the nature of their subjectmatter;
it was only in the later collection that Professor
Child "had no discretion." Other important ballads were
not yet accessible, or not yet discovered: St. Stephen and
Herod (22), The Laily Worm and the Machrel of the Sea (36),
The Queen of Elfan's Nourice (40), The Unquiet Grave (78),
The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry (113). Of the ten, only four
are included in Professor Gummere's collection. The main
addition of the later collection is thus rather in the way of
1 Sheath and Knife (16), also, was accessible but omitted.
792
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
new versions of important ballads, or of more authentic
versions based directly upon the manuscripts; in the citation
of a larger number of foreign parallels; and, generally,
in the matter contained in the introductions.
The Ballads contained 115 pieces which do not appear in
the later collection. The nature of such material, since it is
excluded from the "complete " English and Scottish Popular
Ballads, is significant as throwing some additional light
upon Professor Child's conception. In many cases the
reason for exclusion is made clear by Professor Child himself,
in comments in the earlier or in the later collection.
Of the whole group of lays and romances contained in
Book I of the Ballads, he says: " Some of the longer pieces
in this book are not of the nature of ballads, and require an
apology. They were admitted before the limits of the work
had been determined with exactness." 1 If such pieces as
these do not fulfil the lyrical requirement of the true ballad,
others cannot fulfil the requirement of plot, and the songs
of the Ballads, like A Lyke Wake Dirge, Fair Helen of
Kirconnel, or The Lowlands of Holland 2 find no place in the
later collection. The Ballads contains also translations from
the Danish, and the original and translation of a modern
Greek parallel of the Lenore story; these are naturally not
included in The English and Scottish Popular Ballads.
The later collection is much more chary of the admission
of broadsides or sheet-ballads: in many cases they are relegated
to introductions or appendices; in many more, omitted.
1Ballads, I, xi, n. "Certain short romances which formerly stood in
the First Book, have been dropped from this second Edition [1860], in
order to give the collection a homogeneous character." Ballads [1860],
I, xii.
2 "A song," II, 317. (Where merely volume and page are given the
reference is still to the later collection; references to the earlier are
preceded by the word Ballads.)
793
WALTER MORRIS HART.
William Guiseman is cited merely, under Brown Robin's
Confession (57), as "a copy, improved by tradition, of the
'lament' in 'William Grismond's Downfal,' a broadside of
1650."' The Lament of the Border TWidoww, hich occurs in
Book VI of the Ballads, "shows broader traces of the
sheet-ballad," and is quoted in the introduction to No 106
for "those who are interested in such random inventions (as,
under pardon, they must be called)." 2 Of The Lady Isabella's
1ragedy Professor Child says in the later collection:
"Though perhaps absolutely the silliest ballad that ever was
made, and very far from silly sooth, the broadside was traditionally
propagated in Scotland without so much change as
is usual in such cases." 3 Even in the Ballads one finds this
comment: "The three following pieces [The Spanish Virgin,
Lady Isabella's Tragedy, The Cruel Black] are here inserted
merely as specimens of a class of tales, horrible in their
incidents but feeble in their execution, of which whole
dreary volumes were printed and read about two centuries
ago. They were all of them, probably, founded on Italian
novels." 4 Although the Ballads includes Macpherson's Rant,
it is declared "worthy of a hangman's pen." 5 A number of
tales which employ a highly artificial stanza, such as The
Fray of Suport, The Raid of the Reidswire, or The Flemish
Insurrection, do not find their way into the later collection.
Traces of the modern editor or author become less
common in the later collection. Versions "modernized and
completed by Percy" (Book I, Nos. b and 5b) are
excluded. The cynical Twa Corbies appears only in the
introduction to The Three Ravens; and Motherwell's edition,
declared already in the Ballads to be a "modernized
version," 6 does not appear at all. Motherwell's Bonnie
IIn, 16. II, 429. 3 v, 34, n.
4Ballads, III, 360. Ballads, vi, 263. Ballads, in, 61.
794
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
George Campbell suffers a like fate, and this, we infer,
because "Motherwell made up his 'Bonnie George Campbell'
from B, C, D." 1 As, no doubt, not merely modernized but
modern, Sir Roland is excluded. "This fragment, Motherwell
tells us, was communicated to him by an ingenious
friend, who remembered having heard it sung in his youth.
He does not vouch for its antiquity, and we have little or
no hesitation in pronouncing it a modern composition." 2
Similarly, Lady Anne " is on the face of it a modern composition,
with extensive variations, on the theme of the
popular ballad."3 It is printed in the appendix to No 20.
Earl Richard is "an entirely modern composition, excepting
only the twenty lines of Herd's fragment."
4 Of Auld Maitland
Professor Child says: "Notwithstanding the authority
of Scott and Leyden, I am inclined to agree with Mr
Aytoun, that this ballad is a modern imitation, or if not
that, a comparatively recent composition. It is with reluctance
that I make for it the room it requires."5 The
essential anonymity of the ballad, in Professor Child's final
conception, naturally excludes pieces like Henryson's Robene
and 3lakyne and The Bludy Serk, which had found their
way into the Ballads.6
There are but few instances of definite praise, as ballads,
of pieces included in the earlier collection and excluded
from the later. The Children in the Wood is said to be
"perhaps the most popular of all English ballads. Its
merit is attested by the favor it has enjoyed with so many
generations, and was vindicated to a cold and artificial age
by the kindly pen of Addison."7 We must not forget,
' Iv, 142. 2Ballads, I, 341. I, 218, n. 4Ballads, III, 293.
5Ballads, vi, 220. Cf. Mr Andrew Lang's plea for Auld Maitland,
Folk-Lore, xiII, 191 ff.
6 See also the comments on the Rev. Mr Lamb's Laidley Worm of Spindleston
Heugh, Ballads, I, 386, and cf. p. 772, above.
7 Ballads, III, 128.
795
WALTER MORRIS HART.
however, that Professor Child was fifty years nearer the
kindly pen of Addison. The cold and artificial age, moreover,
was also sentimental and moral; and why, with it,
this ballad was so popular, a single stanza will show:
You that executors be made,
And overseers eke
Of children that be fatherless,
And infants mild and meek;
Take you example by this thing,
And yield to each his right,
Lest God with such like miserye
Your wicked minds requite (vv. 153 ff.).
The Blind Beggar's Daughter of Bednall's Green is said to
be printed from a modern broadside, yet it is characterized
as "this favorite popular ballad." The Nutbrowne Maid is
"this matchless poem," "this beautiful old ballad." 2 Yet,
clearly, it is not a popular ballad at all.
On the whole, it is not difficult to see why the 115
ballads are excluded from the later collection; and one gets
the impression that, had Professor Child chosen to enforce the
conception of the ballad which he already had in mind, most
of them would have been excluded from the earlier collection
as well. This impression is deepened by an examination
of the comments scattered through the Ballads.
He already regarded the ballad as inimitable:3 "The
exclusion of the 'Imitations'. . . . may possibly excite the
regret of a few. ... Whatever may be the merit of the productions
in question, they are never less likely to obtain
credit for it, than when they are brought into comparison
with their professed models." 4
Again, Sir Patrick Spence,
"if not ancient, has been always accepted as such by the
most skilful judges, and is a solitary instance of a successful
Ballads, IV, 161. 2 Ballads, Iv, 143 f.
SCf. p. 757, above. 'Balads, v, iv.
796
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
imitation, in manner and spirit, of the best specimens of
authentic minstrelsy."
Professor Child had already fallen foul of the editors, and
their alterations and interpolations.2 It is interesting to see
how, in many cases, he anticipated the corrections and
comments made possible, for the later collection, by access
to the manuscripts. Of The Child of Elle he says: " So
extensive are Percy's alterations and additions, that the
reader will have no slight difficulty in detecting the few
traces that are left of the genuine composition." 3 Compare:
"So much of Percy's 'Child of Elle' as was genuine, which,
upon the printing of his manuscript, turned out to be one
fifth." 4 Again, Percy acknowledges interpolations, which
"might with some confidence be pointed out. Among them
are certainly most, if not all, of the last twelve stanzas of
the Second Part, which include the catastrophe to the story."
5
In Percy, he says in the later collection, Sir Cawline "is
extended to nearly twice the amount of what is found in the
manuscript, and a tragical turn is forced upon the story." 6
Again: "We have given Gil Morrice as it stands in the
Reliques (iii. 132,) degrading to the margin those stanzas
which are undoubtedly spurious."7 The stanzas thus degraded
turned out to be actually spurious.8 Condemnation
of Buchan is scattered throughout the Ballads. Thus:
"Some resolution has been exercised, and much disgust
suppressed, in retaining certain pieces from Buchan's collections,
so strong is the suspicion that, after having been
procured from very inferior sources, they were tampered
with by the editor." 9
Again: "One uncommonly tasteless
stanza [41, A, 53], the interpolation of some nursery-maid,'0
Ballads, II, 148-149. 'Cf. p. 767, above. Ballads, II, 225.
4 , 88. 5 Ballads, III, 173. 6 II, 56.
7 Ballads, II, 30. 8 II 275. 9 Ballads, I, ix, n.
0 Cf. p. 762, above.
797
WALTER MORRIS HART.
is here omitted. Too many of Buchan's ballads have
suffered in this way, and have become both prolix and
vulgar."' Even in the Ballads Professor Child placed
"no confidence in any of Allan Cunningham's souvenirs of
Scottish song," 2 and his early suspicions3 of the character
of Cunningham's version of Gil Brenton are confirmed in
the later collection.4 King Henry, printed in the earlier
collection "without the editor's [Jamieson's] interpolations,"
5 appears in the same form in the later, except that
stanza 14 is printed in small type, as not being in the
Jamieson-Brown MS. Again, in The Bonny Birdy, "the
lines supplied by Jamieson have been omitted."6 There
is an interesting comment on these lines in the later
collection.7
Professor Child was already aware that change of nationality
was accompanied by change of the scene of action.8
He quoted Scott's account of the locality of The Douglas
Tragedy [= Earl Brand (7, B)], and added: "After so
circumstantial a description of the scene,.... the reader
may be amused to see the same story told in various Scandinavian
ballads, with a no less plausible resemblance to
actual history. This, as has already been pointed out under
Guy of Warwick and Kempion,9 is an ordinary occurrence in
the transmission of legends."
10
He noted, too, the tendency of ballads to combine: "The
natural desire of men to hear more of characters in whom
they have become strongly interested, has frequently stimu-
1 Ballads, I, 306 n. Ballads, II, 220. 3Ballads, I, 270.
4 See , 62, and, for the omitted couplets, I, 80-81.
5Ballads, I, 265. 6Ballads, II, 22.
7l, 260. See, also, the comments on Jamieson's Child Rowland and
Burd Ellen, Ballads, I, 416, and English and Scottish Popular Ballads, v,
201, n.
sCf. p. 769, above. 9Ballads, I, 256. 1?Ballads, II, 115.
798
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
lated the attempt to continue successful fictions."' Sweet
William's Ghost is often made the sequel to other ballads.2
So far as subject-matter is concerned, we find in the
Ballads the same conception of the relation of ballad and
fact. Jane Shore "adheres to matter of fact with a fidelity
very uncommon," 3 and this is, perhaps, one reason why it
does not find a place in the later collection.4 We may
contrast, on the other hand, the two statements in regard
to the relation of Hind Horn and the romance:' Metrical
romances .... are known in many cases to have been
adapted for the entertainment of humbler hearers, by abridgment
in the form of ballads." He regards Hind Horn as a
case of this sort.5
Style and plot, finally, are a test of genuineness: "I
cannot assent to the praise bestowed by Scott on The Outlaw
Murray. The story lacks point and the style is affectednot
that of the unconscious poet of the real traditional
ballad." 6 Though there without comment, it is placed at
the very end of the later collection.
From a comment like this it is obvious that Professor
Child already had in mind the conception of "a real traditional
ballad," a "specimen of authentic minstrelsy." 7
Although he admitted to the earlier collection lays, romances,
songs, broadsides and sheet-ballads, as well as modern or
modernized compositions, yet he was aware that all these
differed from the true ballad. This true ballad, he conceived,
was inimitable, in matter and manner. In transmission it
might suffer, from the invention of a nursery-maid, from
Buchan's beggar, from a " hangman's pen," from the modern
editors. It drew its subject-matter from fact (to which it
1Ballads, II, 64. 2Ballads, II, 45. 3Ballads, VII, 194.
4 Cf. the comment on The Hunting of the Cheviot, Ballads, VII, 25.
5 Ballads, iv, 17. For the later comment, see p. 777, above.
6Ballads, VI, 22. 7 Ballads, II, 148-149.
799
WALTER MORRIS HART.
was not loyal), from romances, from other ballads. In
quality the subject-matter was not " horrible." In style the
true ballad was not feeble in execution, not prolix and
vulgar, and not affected. The earlier conception was not as
complete as the later, and it was by no means so rigorously
enforced. In regard to specific compositions, there was, as
is to be expected, some change of opinion. But the significant
fact is that for at least forty years Professor Child
retained without essential change his conception of the traditional
ballad as a distinct literary type.
V.
We may now bring together the passages in which
Professor Child declared certain ballads to be of the true
"popular" or "traditional" type. The fewness of such
passages is at first surprising, yet it clearly formed no part
of a set purpose to include in his introductions estimates of
this kind, and such "appreciations " seem to have been
either spontaneous,-springing, as in the case of Johnie
Cock, from his delight in the ballad with which he was
concerned,-or intended, as in the case of Edward, as answer
to his predecessors' doubts of authenticity. On ballads like
Lord Randal, Babylon, Hind Horn, Clerk Saunders, Fair
IAargaret and Sweet William, there is no such comment. It
would seem, no doubt, in such cases obviously unnecessary.
Nevertheless the list is fairly representative. We have
examples of the Domestic Ballad,-tragic, in Earl Brand
(7), Edward (13), Old Robin of Portingale (80), Little Musgrave
(81), The Bonny Birdy (82); not tragic, in Child
Waters (63), Young Beichan (53), Queen Eleanor's Confession
(156): we have examples of the Supernatural Ballad,-
transformation, in The Laily Torm and the Machrel of the
Sea (36); fairy, in Thomas Rymer (37); ghost, in The Wife
800
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BAT.TLAD.
of Usher's Well (79): we have examples of the Border
Ballad in Captain Car (178 F) and Jock o the Side (187):
of the Outlaw Ballad in Johnie Cock (114), the Robin Hood
ballads, 117-121: of the Heroic Ballad in King Estmere
(60), Sir Aldingar (59), Sir Patrick Spens (58 A).
Johnie Cock (114): "This precious specimen of the unspoiled traditional
ballad." ii, 1.
Edward (13): '-The word 'brand,' in the first stanza, is possibly more
literary than popular; further than this the language is entirely fit. The
affectedly antique spelling in Percy's copy has given rise to vague suspicions
concerning tbe authenticity of the ballad, or of the language: but as
spelling will not make an old ballad, so it will not unmake one. We have,
but do not need, the later traditional copy to prove the other genuine.
'Edward' is not only unimpeachable, but has ever been regarded as one
of the noblest and most sterling specimens of the popular ballad." I, 167.
The Laily Worm and the Machrel of the Sea (36) : "Somewhat mutilated,
and also defaced, though it be, this ballad has certainly never been
retouched by a pen, but is pure tradition. It has the first stanza in
common with 'Kemp Owyne,' and shares more than that with 'Allison
Gross.' But it is independent of 'Allison Gross,' and has a far more
original sound." I, 315.
Earl Brand (7) . . . . "has preserved most of the incidents of a very
ancient story with a faithfulness unequalled by any ballad that has been
recovered from English oral tradition." I, 88.
The Wife of Usher's Well (79): "A motive for the return of the wife's
three sons is not found in the fragments which remain to us. ... But
supplying a motive would add nothing to the impressiveness of these
verses. Nothing that we have is more profoundly affecting." II, 238.
Thomas Rymer (37): "B .... has been corrupted here and there, but
only by tradition." I, 317.
"The fairy adventures of Thomas and of Ogier have the essential points
in common, and even the particular trait that the fairy is taken to be the
Virgin. The occurrence of this trait again in the ballad, viewed in connection
with the general similarity of the two, will leave no doubt that the
ballad had its source in the romance. Yet it is an entirely popular ballad
as to style,1 and must be of considerable age, though the earliest version
(A) can be traced at furthest only into the first half of the last century."
I, 319 f.
1 " Excepting the two satirical stanzas with which Scott's version (C)
concludes. "
801
WALTER MORRIS HART.
Captain Car (178) : "F is purely traditional and has one fine stanza not
found in any of the foregoing:
Out then spake the lady Margaret,
As she stood on the stair;
The fire was at her goud garters,
The lowe was at her hair." III, 429.
Queen Eleanor's Confession (156) : "There is reason to question whether
this [F] and the other recited versions are anything more than traditional
variations of printed copies. The ballad seems first to have got into print
in the latter part of the seventeenth century, but was no doubt circulating
orally sometime before that, for it is in the truly popular tone." inI, 255.
Robin Hood and the Tanner (126): "The sturdy Arthur a Bland is well
hit off, and, bating the sixteenth and thirty-fifth stanzas, the ballad has a
good popular ring. There is corruption at 83, 123, and perhaps 133."
III, 137.
The earliest Robin Hood ballads (117-121) "are among the best of all
ballads, and perhaps none in English please so many and please so long."
III, 42.
Robin Hood and the Monk (119): "Too much could not be said in praise
of this ballad, but nothing need be said. It is very perfection in its kind;
and yet we have others equally good, and beyond doubt should have had
more, if they had been written down early, as this was, and had not been
left to the chances of tradition. Even writing would not have saved all,
but writing has saved this (in large part), and in excellent form." In, 95.
Child Waters (63): "This charming ballad, which has perhaps no
superior in English, and if not in English perhaps nowhere." II, 84.
("Caution is imperative where so much ground is covered, and no man
should be confident that he can do absolute justice to poetry in a tongue
that he was not born to; but foreign poetry is as likely to be rated too high
as to be undervalued." II, 84, n.)
Jock o the Side (187): "The ballad is one of the best in the world, and
enough to make a horse-trooper of any young borderer, had he lacked the
impulse." III, 477.
Sir Patrick Spens (58, A): "This admired and most admirable ballad."
"It would be hard to point out in ballad poetry, or other, happier or more
refined touches than the two stanzas in A which portray the bootless waiting
of the ladies for the return of the seafarers." II, 17 f.1
Young Beichan (53): "A favorite ballad and most deservedly." I, 455.
King Estmere (60): "While we cannot but be vexed that so distinguished
a ballad, not injured much, so far as we can see, by time, should
See also the comment in the Ballads, quoted p. 804, below.
802
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
not come down to us as it came to Percy, our loss must not be exaggerated.
The changes made by the editor, numerous enough, no doubt, cannot be
very material until we approach the end. Stanzas 63-66 are entirely
suspicious, and it may even be questioned whether the manuscript contained
a word that is in them." ii, 49.
Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard (81): "The noble English ballad."
In, 260.
The Bonny Birdy (82) : "A fine ballad upon the same theme." II, 243.
Old Robin of Portingale (80) : "This fine ballad." II, 240.
Sir Aldingar (69) : "This ballad, one of the most important of all that
the Percy manuscript has saved from oblivion." II, 33.
Robin Hood's Death (120): "B, though found only in late garlands, is
in the fine old strain." III, 103.
Certain ballads are expressly condemned as not "traditional"
or "popular" :
Robin Hood Rescuing Will Stutly (141): "This is a ballad made for
print, with little of the traditional in the matter and nothing in the style.
It may be considered as an imitation of the Rescue of the Three Squires."
III, 185.
Robin Hood's Birth, Breeding, etc. (149) : "The jocular author of this
ballad, who would certainly have been diverted by any one's supposing
him to write under the restraints of tradition.... " In, 214.
The Lovely Northerne Lasse (217, Appendix): "There is an English
'ditty' (not a traditional ballad) .... which was printed in the first half
of the seventeenth century. It is here given in an appendix." Iv, 192.
To these may be added a few examples of less specific
condemnation:
The Earl of Mar's Daughter (270): A Scandinavian ballad and this
"are, perhaps, on a par, for barrenness and folly, but the former may
claim some age and vogue, the Scottish ballad neither." v, 39.
The Drunkard's Legacy (267, Appendix): "The modern ballad ....
used by Percy was 'The Drunkard's Legacy,' an inexpressibly pitiable
ditty." v, 12.
John Thomson and the Turk (266): "This ridiculous ballad." v, 1.
Robin Hood and the Tinker (127) : " The fewest words will best befit this
contemptible imitation of imitations." in, 140.
Robin Hood and Maid Marian (150): "This foolish ditty." III, 218.
Robin Hood and the Valiant Knight (153): "Written, perhaps, because
it was thought that authority should in the end be vindicated against outlaws,
which may explain why this piece surpasses in platitude everything
that goes before." in, 225.
4
803
804 WALTER MORRIS HART.
The Suffolk Miracle (272): "This piece could not be admitted here on
its own merits. At the first look, it would be classed with the vulgar
prodigies printed for hawkers to sell and for Mopsa and Dorcas to buy. It
is not even a good specimen of its kind." v, 58.
We may add from the Ballads half-a-dozen examples of
specific praise:
The Lass of Lochroyan [76, D] : "This beautiful piece." Ballads,
II, 98.
The Queen's Marie [173, I]: Jamieson and Kinloch have each published
a highly dramatic fragment of this terrible story." Ballads, III, 107.
The Lochmaben Harper [192, A]: "This fine old ballad .... has the
genuine ring of the best days of minstrelsy. On account of its excellence,
we give two versions." Ballads, vi, 3.
Earl Richard [68, J] : "This gloomy and impressive romance." Ballads,
III, 3.
Chevy-Chace [162, A]: "Addison's papers in the Spectator .... evince
so true a perception of the merits of this ballad [162, B], shorn as it is of
the most striking beauties of the grand original, that we cannot but deeply
regret his never having seen the ancient and genuine copy ('The noble
ballad,' 162, A; Ballads, vii, 27), which was published by Hearne only a
few days after Addison died." Ballads, vnI, 43.
Sir Andrew Barton [167, A] : " This noble ballad." Ballads, vnI, 56.
Sir Patrick Spence [58, A] : " If not ancient, has been always accepted as
such by the most skilful judges, and is a solitary instance of a successful
imitation, in manner and spirit, of the best specimens of authentic
minstrelsy." Ballads, III, 149.
VI.
We are now in position to attempt a summary of Professor
Child's conception of the popular ballad. He regarded it as
a distinct species of poetry, which precedes the poetry of art,
as the product of a homogeneous people, the expression of
our common human nature, of the mind and heart of the
people, never of the personality of an individual man,
devoid, therefore; of all subjectivity and self-consciousness.
I The numbers in brackets are those affixed to the ballads in the later
collection.
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
Hence the author counts for nothing; hence, too, the ballad
is difficult to imitate and most attempts in this way are
ridiculous failures. In transmission the ballad regularly
departs from the original form, least in the mouths of
unlearned people, more in the hands of professional singers
or editors. It is at its best when it has come down by a
purely domestic tradition, yet even so it is sometimes influenced
by printed literature; and much depends on the
experience and selection of the reciters, and on their varying
memory, which is, however, ordinarily remarkable for
its tenacity. Less fortunate is the ballad when it passes
through low mouths or hands, suffering corruption of various
kinds,-in the style of the attorney's clerk, or the housemaid
or the serving-man, or ostler, or blind beggar. In the
hands of the bdnkelsdnger or of the minstrel, the ballad
departs still further from its original form. Or, rewritten
for the broadside press, it is seriously enfeebled, or retrenched
and marred, though it may retain some original features, and
there are thus degrees of departure from the original matter
and manner. The broadside may, in turn, become tradition.
It is, so far as it appears in Professor Child's later collection,
always founded on tradition, and this tradition lives after the
composition of the broadside, and may influence the later
versions of the printed form. Last comes the modern editor,
and by him the ballad is sometimes lengthened,-by combination
of different versions, by interpolation of new stanzas,
always more or less unlike the popular style; or it is sometimes
"improved," or retouched, or emended, or altered,-
changed to something in glaring contrast to the groundwork.
Some results of the vicissitudes of transmission are, the
change of the hero's nationality, of his name, of his role;
change of the scene of action; corruption of diction resulting
in perversion of sense or in nonsense; introduction of learned
words. The ballad thus suffers in transmission, and is at its
805
WALTER MORRIS HART.
best when it is early caught and fixed in print. It is sometimes
counterfeited or imitated, and counterfeits are included
in the later collection for contrast, for much the same reason
that thieves are photographed, or because they may contain
relics of something genuine or better.
Of the Subject-Matter of the ballad, the sources may be,
and in the best instances are, purely popular, consisting of
material which appears only in popular literature. Professor
Child mentions no instance where a prose tale is the source
of a ballad, but the ballad, he says, may sometimes be
resolved into a prose tale. Popular origin is attested by
foreign parallels in folk-literature. Of such literature certain
features or themes are characteristic, such as the quibbling
oath, the miraculous harvest, the childbirth in the wood, the
testament, the riddle, heroic sentiment, etc. The source
may, again, be an actual occurrence, in which case the
ballad, while not deliberate fiction, is yet not loyal to
the fact. Or the source may be a romance, or the source
of a romance, in which case oral tradition may be older than
written, the ballad older than the romance. Or the source
may be earlier ballads, mechanically and deliberately put
together in later ones, made over and assimilated in the Gest
of Robin Hood. In the course of transmission certain
features appear which are not characteristic of popular literature;
the subject-matter of the true ballad does not deal in
extravagance, or exaggeration, or platitude; it is not prosaic,
over-refined, cynical, sophisticated, sentimental, unnatural,
trite, or moral, though the "pungent buckishness" of the
broadside, and the gay cynicism of the minstrel, are foreign
to it.
So far as Technique is concerned, the ballad must have
plot. The story may not be completely told; conclusion,
transitions, and preliminaries may be omitted; but the result
is not nonsense, the ballad is not incoherent. At its best
806
PROFESSOR CHILD AND THE BALLAD.
it is, however, brief. It is careless of geography, and,
except in some,-and some of the best,-of the Robin
Hood ballads, it touches Setting lightly. In dealing with
the Supernatural it does not attempt to explain the action or
to describe supernatural figures; ghosts, however, do not
walk without reason.
In Style the ballad is artless and homely, and in it the
conceit, and literary or learned words and phrases, are out
of place. Yet it has certain conventions of its own, such
as the "commonplace," the repetition of a message by a
messenger, the verbally similar treatment of similar incidents
as they occur in different ballads. Emotionally, the
ghost ballad is impressive and affecting; and, in general,
the ballad may be infectious, or spirited and life-like, or
pathetic, or tender, or humorous, or vigorous and not lacking
in color or flavor. It is essentially lyrical, and its lyrical
quality is not less essential than plot. Often it absolutely
requires the support of a melody and the comment of a
burden. This burden sometimes foreshadows the calamity,
sometimes enhances by contrast the gloom of the conclusion.
It is usually less than the stanza with which it was sung;
and, unlike the refrain, it was sung, not after the stanza,
but with it. It is sometimes of different metre, sometimes
not. The absence of the burden is in no case proof that it
never existed.

WALTER MORRIS HART

-------------------------------
Footnotes:

1 Modern Philology, I, 377 f.

2. Professor Gummere in Modern Philology, I, 378.

3. II, 136. 

4 , vii. 759

5. III, 303

6. II, 296

7. I, 264

8. II, 263. An old woman (the reciter of E) knew Chield Morice as a child, but later learned Gil Morice which began to be more fashionable.

9. n, 464, n

10. v, 178

10. I, 119