The only English version of this ballad is a broadside, found in the Roxburghe Collection.[foot-note] It was given from a black-letter copy, with changes and the omission of stanza 4, in the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, 1765, III, 75. Hearne, in his preface to Guilielmi Neubrigensis Historia, I, lxx (cited by Percy), remarks that some impressions were adorned with the picture of a queen, meant, as he maintains, to be Elizabeth, and quotes the first stanza,[foot-note] From this Percy infers that the ballad was popular in Elizabeth's time, a supposition probable enough in itself, and confirmed by the fifteenth stanza occurring (as Percy notes) in Fletcher's comedy of 'The Pilgrim,' 1621.[foot-note]
Motherwell, Minstrelsy, Introduction, p. lxvi, says that the ballad was current in Scot land in many shapes (1827).
The copy in Kinloch's Ancient Scottish Ballads, p. 13, is C, with the stanzas given here as D incorporated into it from another version.
Kinloch is fully justified in claiming for the Scottish ballad a decided superiority. The humorous artifices which the lady practises to maintain the character of a beggar's brat are, as he says, kept up with great spirit and fancy, and, as far as we know, are entirely of Scottish invention. It might perhaps be objected that in the course of tradition they have been exaggerated in later copies to a point threaten ing weariness.
The passage in which the knight rides off and is followed so closely by the maid, through river and all, A 6-8, B 510, etc., is found also in 'Child Waters,' A 11-16, B 4-11, etc., and suits both ballads perhaps equally well.
Parts of this ballad inevitably suggest a parallel with the tales belonging to the class of the 'Marriage of Sir Gawain.'[foot-note] In the Wife of Bath's Tale, a lusty bachelor who has been out hawking meets a maid walking, and forces her to yield to his will. The offence is brought before King Arthur,[foot-note] and the knight, as he is also called, is condemned to death. The alternative of marrying is so distasteful to him that he tries every means to avoid it. 'Take all my good,' he says to the woman, 'but let my body go.' But all for naught. Dame Ragnell makes a point of being wedded in high style; so does our shepherd's daughter in E 37, 38, F 38, 39. In Gower, the knight takes the woman on his horse and rides away sighing; and they also have a cauld and eerie ride in B 39. The bride becomes, if possible, more and more repulsive in the Gawain tales, and endeavors to make herself so in the ballad. As in the tales, so in the ballad, the bridegroom will not turn about and make much of her, C 29, E 56, G 30. The ugly woman turns out to be a king's daughter in Gower's tale, a most desirable wife in all the others; and the shepherdess is a king's daughter in B, E, F, K, and at least an excellent match in other copies. The knight is nephew to a king or emperor in three of the tales, and the queen's brother or the king's in nearly all the ballads.[foot-note] Even the Billy Blin in F 60-63, G 31, 32, cf. D 15, 16, looks like a remnant of the fairy machinery of the Gawain tales.
The tragic ballad of 'Ebbe Gait,' Danske Viser, II, 47, No 63, has several features in common with 'The Knight and Shepherd's Daughter.' Ebbe Gait has been drinking heavily with the king's men. Riding home through a wood, he meets in an evil hour a farmer's pretty wife, and offers her presents to show him the way to the town. She under takes to do so, though much afraid. They come to the farmer's house. Ebbe Gait begins to ban and beat, and in the end ravishes the woman, using extreme cruelty. She says, Now you have had your will of me, with little good to either of us, for God's sake tell me your name. He declares himself to be Ebbe Gait. The farmer comes home and is told all. He comforts his wife and goes to make his plaint to the king. If any man in the court has done this, says the king, it shall cost him his life. When he learns that the man is his nephew, he would rather than half Denmark not have pronounced so harsh a doom. Ebbe Gait is summoned to answer for himself. He is not much better sober than drunk, though the ballad lays the fault on ale. He tells the farmer to produce his wife; she will make no complaint. The woman gives her evidence. She had treated Ebbe Gait with all hospitality as her husband's guest. He had broken in the doors of the room where she was with her children, beaten five maids and killed three swains. Ebbe's father offers his horse and a thousand mark as ransom. The king says that he him self, if it lay in him, would have redeemed the youth with three thousand; Ebbe Gait shall die. While they are taking him off, Ebbe is flippant: he would not mind losing his life had the woman been prettier.
There is a very favorite Scandinavian ballad, see 'Tarningspillet,' Grundtvig, IV, 402, No 238, in which a fair lady challenges a young horse-boy, or boatswain, to play tables with her, and after having won from him all he has, stakes herself against his shoes or the like. The youth now wins; she makes him handsome offers, rising constantly in value, to let her off, but he will not. God pity me! she says; but he reveals to her that her case is not a bad one, for he is the best king's son in the world.[foot-note]
An imitation of the English ballad by Laplace, 'Lise et Mainfroi,' 1740, terminates more sentimentally. The shepherdess persists that she will have the hand which the king has awarded her, until she stands before the altar. She then declares that her sense of honor has been satisfied, and resigns a very advantageous match (for she is not a princess in disguise), with "Puisses-tu du moins quelquefois te souvenir de ta bergère!" Mainfroi exclaims in a transport, Stay, deign to be my wife! the king and all the court unite in the entreaty, and Lise yields. She certainly is entitled to a statuette in porcelain. See Charles Malo, Les Chansons d'Autrefois, pp. 124-128.
The copy in Percy's Reliques is translated by Bodmer, I, 88.
This page most recently updated on 22-Mar-2011, 16:45:28. Return to main index
