Ed de Moel

Child Ballads - Additions and Corrections

4. Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight

P. 22 b. D. Add: d. 'The historical ballad of May Culzean,' an undated stall-copy.

26 b. Another Dutch version (Frisian), spirited, but with gaps, is given by Dykstra and van der Meulen, In Doaze fol aide Snypsnaren, Frjentsjer, 1882, p. 118, 'Jan Alberts,' 66 vv. (Köhler.)

D. Jan Alberts sings a song, and those that hear it know it not. It is heard by a king's daughter, who asks her mother's leave to go out for a walk, and is told that it is all one where she goes or stays, if she keeps her honor. Her father says the same, when she applies for his leave. She goes to her bedroom and dresses herself finely, dons a gold crown, puts her head out of the window, and cries, Now am I Jan Alberts' bride. Jan Alberts takes her on his horse; they ride fast and long, with nothing to eat or drink for three days. She then asks Jan why he gives her nothing, and he answers that he shall ride to the high tree where hang fourteen fair maids. Arrived there, he gives her the choice of tree, sword, or water. She chooses the sword, bids him spare his coat, for a pure maid's blood goes far, and before his coat is half off his head lies behind him. The head cries, Behind the bush is a pot of grease; smear my neck with it. She will not smear from a murderer's pot, nor blow in a murderer's horn. She mounts his horse, and rides far and long. Jan Alberts' mother comes to meet her, and asks after him. She says he is not far off, and is sporting with fourteen maids. Had you told me this before, I would have laid you in the water, says the mother. The maid rides on till she comes to her father's gate. Then she cries to her father to open, for his youngest daughter is without. The father not bestirring himself, she swims the moat, and, the door not being open, goes through the glass. The next day she dries her clothes.

30 a, 37 a. There is a Low German version of the first class, A-F, in Spee, Volksthümliches vom Niederrhein, Köln, 1875, Zweites Heft, p. 3, 'Schöndili,' 50 vv. (Köhler.)

AA. Schöndili's parents died when she was a child. Schön-Albert, knowing this, rides to her. She attires herself in silk, with a gold crown on her hair, and he swings her on to his horse. They ride three days and nights, with nothing to eat or drink. She asks whether it is not meal-time; he replies that they are coming to a linden, where they will eat and drink. Seven women are hanging on the tree. He gives her the wale of tree, river, and sword. She chooses the sword; would be loath to spot his coat; whips off his head before the coat is half off. The head says there is a pipe in the saddle; she thinks no good can come of playing a murderer's pipe. She meets first the father, then the mother; they think that must be Schön-Albert's horse. That may be, she says; I have not seen him since yesterday. She sets the pipe to her mouth, when she reaches her father's gate, and the murderers come like hares on the wind.

BB. Alfred Müller, Volkslieder aus dem Erzgebirge, p. 92, 'Schön Ulrich' [und Trautendelein], 36 vv. (Köhler.) Like T, without the song.

CC. A. Schlösser, Deutsche Volkslieder aus Steiermark, 1881, p. 338, No 309, 'Der Ritter und die Maid.' (Köhler: not yet seen by me.)

DD. Curt Mündel, Elsässische Volkslieder, p. 12, No 10, a fragment of fifteen verses. As Anna sits by the Rhine combing her hair, Heinrich comes along on his horse, sees her weep, and asks why. It is not for gold and not for goods, but because she is to die that day. Heinrich draws his sword, runs her through, and rides home. He is asked why his sword is red, and says he has killed two doves. They say the dove must be Anna.

32 b. H, line 10. Read: umbrunnen.

39 a, line 1. Read: contributed by Hoffmann.

39 a, third paragraph. Kozłowski, Lud, p. 54, No 15, furnishes a second and inferior but still important form of A (Masovian).

A b. Ligar (afterwards Jasia, Golo) bids Kasia take all she has. She has already done this, and is ready to range the world with him. Suddenly she asks, after they have been some time on their way, What is that yonder so green? Jasia replies, Our house, to which we are going. They go on further, and Kasia again inquires abruptly, What is that yonder so white? "That is my eight wives, and you shall he the ninth: you are to die, and will be the tenth." "Where is the gold, the maidens' gold?" "In the linden, Kasia, in the linden; plenty of it." "Let me not die so wretchedly; let me draw your sword for once." She drew the sword, and with one stroke Jasia's head was off.

39 b. To the Polish versions are further to be added: NN, Piosnki wieśniacze. znad Dzwiny, p. 41, No 51; OO, Roger, p. 78, No 138; PP, Roger, p. 69, No 125; QQ, ib., p. 79, No 140; RR, p. 81, No 142; SS, p. 79, No 139. The last three are imperfect, and QQ, RR, have a beginning which belongs elsewhere. Jasia suggests to Kasia to get the key of the new room from her mother by pretending headache, and bids her take gold enough, NN, OO. They go off while her mother thinks that Kasia is sleeping, NN, OO, QQ. They come to a wood, NN, PP (which is corrupt here), SS; first or last, to a deep stream, NN, OO, QQ, SS; it is red sea in RR, as in J. Jasia bids Kasia return to her mother, NN (twice), RR; bids her take off her rich clothes, OO, to which she answers that she has not come here for that. John throws her into the water, NN, OO, QQ, SS, from a bridge in the second and third. Her apron catches on a stake or post; she begs John for help, and gets for answer, ... I did not throw you in to help you: you may go to the bottom," OO. She swims to a stake, to which she clings, and John hews her in three, QQ. Fishermen draw out the body, and carry it to the church, NN, OO. She apostrophizes her hair in QQ, SS, as in G, I, J, and in the same absurd terms in QQ as in J. John is pursued and cut to pieces in OO, also broken on the wheel. PP closely resembles German ballads of the third class. Katie shouts three times: at her first cry the grass curls up; at the second the river overflows; the third wakes her mother, who rouses her sons, saying, Katie is calling in the wood. They find John with a bloody sword; he says he has killed a dove. They answer, No dove, but our sister, and maltreat him till he tells what he has done with his victim: "I have hidden her under the yew-bush; now put me on the wheel."

39 b, line 13 of the middle paragraph. Read Piosnki for Pieśni, and omit the quotation marks in this and tbe line before.

40 b, line 2 (the girl's adding her hair to lengthen the cord). In the tale of the Sea-horse, Schiefner, Awarische Texte, Memoirs of the St. Petersburg Academy, vol. XIX, No 6, p. 11 f, a sixty-ell rope being required to rescue a prince from a well into which be had been thrown, and no rope forthcoming, the daughter of a sea-king makes a rope of the required length with her hair, and with this the prince is drawn out. Dr. Reinhold Köhler, who pointed out this incident to me, refers in his notes to the texts, at p. vii f, to the song of Südäi Märgän, Radloff, II, 627-31, where Südäi Märgän's wife, having to rescue her husband from a pit, tries first his horse's tail, and finds it too short, then her hair, which proves also a little short. A maid is then found whose hair is a hundred fathoms long, and her hair being tied on to the horse's tail, and horse, wife, and maid pulling together, the hero is drawn out. For climbing up by a maid's hair, see, further, Köhler's note to Gonzenbach, No 53, II, 236.

40 b, line 7. A message is sent to a father by a daughter in the same way, in Chodzko, Les Chants historiques de l'Ukraine, p. 75; cf. p. 92, of the same. Tristram sends messages to Isonde hy linden shavings inscribed with runes: Sir Tristrem, ed. Kölbing, p. 56, st. 187; Tristrams Saga, cap. 54, p. 68, ed. Kölbing; Gottfried von Strassburg, vv 14427-441.

40 b, line 36. For G, I, read G, J.

40, note †. In a Ruthenian ballad a girl who runs away from her mother with a lover tells her brothers, who have come in search of her, I did not leave home to go back again with you: Golovatsky, Part I, p. 77, No 32; Part III, I, p. 17, No 4, p. 18, No 5. So, "I have not poisoned you to help you," Part I, p. 206, No 32, p. 207, No 33.

41 a, second paragraph. Golovatsky, at I, 116, No 29, has a ballad, found elsewhere without the feature here to be noticed, in which a Cossack, who is watering his horse while a maid is drawing water, describes his home as a Wonderland, like John in Polish Q. "Come to the Ukraine with the Cossacks," he says. "Our land is not like this: with us the mountains are golden, the water is mead, the grass is silk; with us the willows bear pears and the girls go in gold." She yields; they go over one mountain and another, and when they have crossed the third the Cossack lets his horse graze. The maid falls to weeping, and asks the Cossack, Where are yonr golden mountains, where the water that is mead, the grass that is silk? He answers, No girl of sense and reason engages herself to a young Cossack. So in Zegota Pauli, P. 1. ruskiego, p. 29, No 26 = Golovatsky, I, 117, No 30, where the maid rejoins to the glowing description, I have ranged the world: golden mountains I never saw; everywhere mountains are of stone, and everywhere rivers are of water; very like the girl in Grundtvig, 82 B, st. 7; 183 A 6, E 5, 6.

41 b, last paragraph. Several Bohemian versions are to be added to the single example cited from Waldau's Böhmische Granaten. This version, which is presumed to have been taken down by Waldau himself; may be distinguished as A. B, Susil, Moravské Národní Písnĕ, No 189, p. 191, 'Vrah,' 'The Murderer,' is very like A. C, Sušil, p. 193. D, Erben, Prostomárodni české Písnĕ a Říkadla, p. 480, No 16, 'Zabité dĕvče,' 'The Murdered Maid.' E, p. 479, No 15, 'Zabitá sestra,' 'The Murdered Sister.' B has a double set of names, beginning with Black George, — not the Servian, but "king of Hungary," — and ending with Indriasch. The maid is once called Annie, otherwise Katie. At her first call the grass becomes green; at the second the mountain bows; the third the mother hears. C has marvels of its own. Anna entreats John to allow her to call to her mother. "Call, call," he says, " you will not reach her with your call; in this dark wood, even the birds will not hear you." At her first call a pine-tree in the forest breaks; at the second the river overflows; at the third her mother rises from the grave. She calls to her sons to go to Anna's rescue, and they rise from their graves. The miscreant John confesses that he has buried their sister in the wood. They strike off his head, and put a hat on the head, with an inscription in gold letters, to inform people what his offence has been. There is a gap after the seventh stanza of D, which leaves the two following stanzas unintelligible by themselves: 8, Choose one of the two, and trust nobody; 9, She made her choice, and shouted three times towards the mountains. At the first cry the mountain became green; at the second the mountain bowed backwards; the third the mother heard. She sent her sons off; they found their neighbor John, who had cut off their sister's head. The law-abiding, and therefore modern, young men say that John shall go to prison and never come out alive. In E the man, a young hunter, says, Call five times; not even a wood-bird will hear you. Nothing is said of the first call; the second is heard by the younger brother, who tells the elder that their sister must be in trouble. The hunter has a bloody rifle in his hand: how he is disposed of we are not told. All these ballads but C begin with the maid cutting grass, and all of them have the dove that is "no dove, but our sister."

Fragments of this ballad are found, F, in Sušil, p. 112, No 113, 'Nevĕsta nešt' astnice,' 'The Unhappy Bride;' G, p. 171, No 171, 'Zbojce,' 'The Murderer;, and there is a variation from B at p. 192, note 3, which is worth remarking, H. F, sts 11-14: "Get together what belongs to you; we will go to a foreign land;" and when they came to the turf, "Look my head through."[foot-note] Every hair she laid aside she wet with a tear. And when they came into the dark of the wood he cut her into nine [three] pieces. G. Katie meets John in a meadow; they sit down on the grass. "Look my head through." She weeps, for she says there is a black fate impending over her; "a black one for me, a red one for thee." He gets angry, cuts off her head, and throws her into the river, for which he is hanged. H. He sprang from his horse, robbed the maid, and laughed. He set her on the grass, and bade her look his head through. Every hair she examined she dropped a tear for. "Why do you weep, Katie? Is it for your crants?" "I am not weeping for my crants, nor am I afraid of your sword. Let me call three times, that my father and mother may hear." Compare (German H 10, 11 Q 8-10, etc. etc.

42 a. These Ruthenian ballads belong with the other Slavic parallels to No. 4: A. Zagota Pauli; P. 1. ruskiego, p. 21 = Golovatsky, III, I, 149, No 21; B. Golovatsky, III, I, 172, No 46. A. A man induces a girl to go off with him in the night. They wander over one land and another, and then feel need of rest. Why does your head ache? he asks of her. Are you homesick? "My head does not ache; I am not homesick." He takes her by the white sides and throws her into the deep Donau, saying, Swim with the stream; we shall not live together. She swims over the yellow sand, crying, Was I not fair, or was it my fate? and he dryly answers, Fair; it was thy fate. In B it is a Jew's daughter that is wiled away. They go in one wagon; another is laden with boxes [of valuables?] and pillows, a third with gold pennies. She asks, Where is your house? Over those hills, he answers. He takes her over a high bridge, and throws her into the Donau, with, Swim, since you were not acquainted with our way, our faith!

42 a. A, line 2. Read: Puymaigre.

43 a. D. Add: Poésies populaires de la France, IV, fol. 332, Chanson de l'Aunis, Charente Inférieur; but even more of the story is lost.

44 a. A ballad in Casetti e Imbriani, C.p. delle Provincie meridionali, II, 1, begins like 'La Contadina alla Fonte' (see p. 393 a), and ends like 'La Monferrina Incontaminata.' Of the same class as the last is, I suppose, Nannarelli, Studio comparativo sui Canti popolari di Arlena, p. 51, No 50 (Köhler), which I regret not yet to have seen.

45 a. Portuguese C, D, in Alvaro Rodrigues de Azevedo, Romanceiro do Archipelago da Madeira, p. 57, 'Estoria do Bravo-Franco,' p. 60, 'Gallo-frango.'

47. A story from Neumünster about one Görtmicheel, a famous robber, in Müllenhoff, p. 37, No 2, blends features of 'Hind Etin,' or 'The Maid and the Dwarf-King,' No 41, with others found in the Magyar ballad, p. 45 f. A handsome wench, who had been lost seven years, suddenly reappeared at the home of her parents. She said that she was not at liberty to explain where she had been, but her mother induced her to reveal this to a stone near the side-door, and taking up her station behind the door heard all. She had been carried off by a robber; had lived with him seven years, and borne him seven children. The robber, who had otherwise treated her well, had refused to let her visit her home, but finally had granted her this permission upon her promising to say nothing about him. When the time arrived for her daughter to go back, the mother gave her a bag of peas, which she was to drop one by one along the way. She was kindly received, but presently the robber thought there was something strange in her ways. He laid his head in her lap, inviting her to perform the service so common in like cases. While she was doing this, she could not but think how the robber had loved her and how he was about to be betrayed by her, and her remorseful tears dropped on his face. "So you have told of me!" cried the astute robber, springing up. He cut off the children's heads and strung them on a willow-twig before her eyes, and was now coming to her, when people arrived, under the mother's conduct, who put a stop to his further revenge, and took their own. See the note, Müllenhoff, p. 592 f.

57 a. D. Insert: d. A stall-copy lent me by Mrs. Alexander Forbes, Liberton, Edinburgh. (See p. 23, note §.)

62 b. Insert after c:

d.  11,2. Have ye not heard of fause Sir John,
Wha livd in the west country?
After 2 a stanza nearly as in b.
5 wanting.
61. But he's taen a charm frae aff his arm.
63. follow him.
72. five hundred.
73. the bravest horse.
81. So merrily.
84. Which is called Benan Bay.
9, 11, wanting.
121. Cast aff, cast aff.
124. To sink.
13. Nearly as in b.
14. 'Cast aff thy coats and gay mantle,
And smock o Holland lawn,
For thei'r owre costly and owre guid
To rot in the sea san.'

15. 'Then turn thee round, I pray, Sir John,
See the leaf flee owre the tree,
For it never befitted a book-learned man
A naked lady to see.'
Sir John being a Dominican friar, according to the historical preface.
18. As fause Sir John did turn him round,
To see the leaf flee owre the [tree],
She grasped him in her arms sma,
And flung him in the sea.

17. 'Now lie ye there, ye wild Sir John,
Whar ye thought to lay me;
Ye wad hae drownd me as naked's I was born,
But ye's get yom' claes frae me!'

18. Her jewels, costly, rich and rare,
She straight puts on again;
She lightly springs upon her horse,
And leads his by the rein.

213. O that's a foundling.
22. Then out and spake the green parrot,
He says, Fair May Culzean,
O what hae ye done wi yon brave knight?

23. 'Haud your tongue, my pretty parrot,
An I'se be kind to thee;
For where ye got ae handfu a groats,
My parrot shall get three.'

25. 'There came a cat into my cage,
Had nearly worried me,
And I was calling on May Culzean
To come and set me free.'

27 wanting.
283. Carleton sands.
292. Was dashed.
293. The golden ring.

This page most recently updated on 12-Jun-2011, 16:44:08.
Return to main index