The copy in Christie's Traditional Ballad Airs, I, 252, is abridged from C, with half a dozen arbitrary and insignificant changes.
Skippers (lords) of Lothain, A, of Scarsburgh, C, of Aberdeen, D, are bragging over their drink: some, absurdly enough, of their hawks and hounds, A-C, some of their ladies, young Allan of his ship, which will outsail all others but three.[foot-note] A boy in A, C, says that his master has a boat (it is a coal-carrier in C) which will take the wind from him. A wager is laid, A, B, C. All the rest go to drinking, 'to the tows,' but Allan to his prayers, C 8. They sail; there is a terrible storm, in the course of which the, three competitors are 'rent in nine,' A 9, or two of them sink, and the topmast of the third 'gaes in nine,' E 7-9.
In A they have sailed only a few leagues, when Allan's ship is so racked by the storm that they see water through her sides. At this point, especially in A, Allan's seamanship appears to very little advantage; he is more of a fair-weather yachtsman than of a skeely skipper. If he could get a bonny boy to take the helm and bring the ship in safe, the boy should have a liberal share of his gold and land, and a daughter Ann besides, whom one is surprised that Young Allan should have to offer. In A and D the bonny boy evidently takes command of the ship, although in A 18 the sailors ascribe their safety, under God, to their good master. The ballad indeed suffers almost as grievously as the comely cog.
In B-E Allan calls for a bonny boy to take the helm while he goes to the masthead to look for land. In D he makes the same promises as in A, but the bonny boy cares only for Ann. In B, C the bonny boy suggests that Allan should waken his drunken men, for whom good thick shoes had been bought, though none had been given him. But in all the boy takes the helm, and in fact keeps it till the ship is in. Allan, at the masthead, can see neither day nor landmark; many feather-beds are floating on the water, B, C. The boy calls his master down; the sea can be seen through the ship's sides, B-E.
Orders are given, by the boy or by Allan (by the boy certainly in D, and by Allan in E), to take feather-beds and canvas and lay, busk, or wrap the ship round; pitch and tar are also recommended in B, C. This done, Allan addresses the ship: Spring up, and gold shall be your hire, A; Haste to dry land, and every nail that is in you shall be a gold pin, B; For every iron nail in you, of gold there shall be ten, C; in D, indirectly, Where she wants an iron nail drive in a silver pin, and where she wants an oaken bolt beat in the gold, and the like in E. When the ship hears this, she springs from the water like sparks from the tire, A-C.
The first shore they come to is Troup, B, Howdoloot, C, Linn, D, E. The ship is kept off with cannon, B, C, with spears and bayonets, D; is towed in (wrongly), E. The next shore they come to is Lee, B, E, Howdilee, C, wanting in D; 'they bare her to the sea,' C, 'they turned their ship about,' D, the ship is towed in (wrongly), B, E. The third shore they come to is Lin, B, Howdilin, C, Aberdeen, D; the ship is towed in (welcomed), with drums beating and pipes playing, B, C, D.
Allan calls for the bonny boy that brought the ship safe in, that took the helm in hand, and offers him gold, land, and his daughter; the boy rejects gold and land, and takes the daughter, A, D; Allan makes over to the boy his comely cog and gives him his daughter, B; gives him his daughter, C.
Five-and-forty ships, A, three-and-fifty, C, one-and-twenty, E, went to sea, and only one came back.[foot-note]
This ballad is mixed with that of 'Sir Patrick Spens,' No 58, II, 21 ff. E 1-6 belong entirely to No 58, and K 6-10, M 1, 3, of No 58 belong to 'Young Allan.' The bonny boy is found in 58, B, C, E, G, I, J; the floating feather-beds occur in E-H, J, O, R; the sea is seen through the ship in 58, C 15, I 21; cloth is wapped into the ship's side to keep out water, H 19, 20; feather-beds and canvas (and pitch) are used as here in I 22, 23.
By far the most interesting feature in this ballad is Allan's addressing his ship and the ship's intelligent behavior, A 16, 17, B 12-15, C 21-22. Frioðþjóf's ship Elliða understood and obeyed the speech of its master: Fornaldar Sogur, II, 79, 443 (cited by Bugge). Ranild's ship came to him when he blew his horn: 'Svend Ranild,' Grundtvig, No 28, I, 867 (translated by Prior, I, 286). In another Danish ballad, and one of the best, the Ox when sailed by St. Olav, responds to his commands as if fully endowed with consciousness; he thwacks it in the side and over the eye, and it goes faster and faster; but it is animate only for the nonce: 'Hellig-Olavs Vasddefart,' Grundtvig, No 50, II, 134, Prior, I, 356.
The Phæacian ships have neither helmsman nor helm, and know men's minds and the way to all cities: Odyssey, viii, 557 ff. There is a magical self-moving ship in Marie de France's Guigemar, and elsewhere.
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