a seems to have been communicated to Percy by Roger Halt in 1775. b was contributed to Caw's Museum by John Elliot of Reidheugh, a gentleman, says Scott, well skilled in the antiquities of the western border, c was taken down "from the singing and recitation of a Liddesdale-man, namely, Robert Shortreed, sheriff-substitute of Roxburghshire, in the autumn of 1816;" but it differs from b in no important respect except the omission of thirteen stanzas, 17, 18, 24, 32, 35-38, 51, 52, 5658. The ballad was popular before the end of the sixteenth century, as is shown by a passage in Nashe's Have with you to Saffron Walden, 1596: "Dick of the Cow, that mad demi-lance northren borderer, who plaied his prizes with the lord Jockey so bravely" (Grosart's Nashe, III, 6). In a list of books printed for and sold by P. Brooksby, 1688, occurs "Dick-athe-Cow, containing north-country songs." The Cow in Dick's name can have no reference to cattle, for then his style would have been 'Dick o the Kye.' It may possibly denote the hut in which he lived; or brush, or broom.
This page most recently updated on 10-Dec-2010, 17:05:56. Return to main index
