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JOHNIE OP BBEADISLEE. |
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and the editor did not fail to notice that he had probably lighted on the ballad of Johny Cox, which BJtson says the Eev. Mr. Boyd faintly recollected, {Scottish Song, I. p. xxxvi.) Motherwell, not aware of what Fry had done, printed a few stanzas belonging to the first of these versions, under the title of Johnie of Braidisbank {Minstrelsy, Ancient and Modern, p. 23), and Kinloch recovered a nearly complete story. Another copy of this last has been published from Buchan's manuscripts in Scottish Traditional Versions of Ancient Ballads (Percy Society, vol. xvii. p. 77). Chambers, in his Scottish Ballads, p. 181, has compounded Scott's, Kinloch's, and Motherwell's copies, interspersing a few additional stanzas of no value. Scott's and Kinloch's versions are given in this place, and Fry's fragments (which contain several beautiful stanzas) in the Appendix.
Johnie rose up in a May morning, Call'd for water to wash his hands—
" Gar loose to me the gude graie dogs, That are bound wi' iron bands."
When Johnie's mother gat word o' that, s
Her hands for dule she wrang— " 0 Johnie ! for my benison,
To the greenwood dinna gang !
" Eneugh ye hae o' gude wheat bread,
And eneugh o' the blood-red wine ; w
And, therefore, for nae venison, Johnie, I pray ye, stir frae hame." |
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