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A French Queen shall bear the son, Shall rule all Britain to the sea; He of the Bruce's blood shall come, As near as in the ninth degree.

"The waters worship shall his race;

Likewise the waves of the farthest sea;

For they shall ride over ocean wide,
With hempen bridles, and horse of tree."

Thomas the Rhymer.

PART THIRD.-MODERN.

BY WALTER SCOTT.

THOMAS THE RHYMER was renowned among his contemporaries, as the author of the celebrated romance of Sir Tristrem. Of this once-admired poem only one copy is now known to exist, which is in the Advocates' Library. The Editor, in 1804, published a small edition of this curious work; which, if it does not revive the reputation of the bard of Ercildoune, is at least the earliest specimen of Scottish poetry hitherto published. Some account of this romance has already been given to the world in Mr. ELLIS's Specimens of Ancient Poetry, vol. i. p. 165, iii. p. 410; a work to which our predecessors and our posterity are alike obliged; the former, for the preservation of the best-selected examples of their poetical taste; and the latter, for a history of the English language, which will only cease to be interesting with the existence of our mother-tongue, and all that genius and learning have recorded in it. It is sufficient here to mention, that so great was the reputation of the romance of Sir Tristrem, that few were thought capable of reciting it after the manner of the author-a circumstance alluded to by Robert de Brunne, the annalist :

"I see in song, in sedgeyng tale,

Of Erceldoun, and of Kendale,
Now thame says as they thame wroght,
And in thare saying it semes nocht.
That thou may here in Sir Tristrem,
Over gestes it has the steme,
Over all that is or was;

If men it said as made Thomas," &c.

It appears, from a very curious MS. of the thirteenth century, penes Mr. Douce of London, containing a French metrical romance of Sir Tristrem, that the work of our Thomas the Rhymer was known, and re

Ruberslaw and Dunyon, are two hills near Jedburgh. ? An ancient tower near Ercildoune, belonging to a family of the name of Home. One of Thomas's prophecies is said to have run thus:

"Vengeance! vengeance! when and where?

On the house of Coldingknow, now and ever nair!"

ferred to, by the minstrels of Normandy and Bretagne Having arrived at a part of the romance where reciters were wont to differ in the mode of telling the story, the French bard expressly cites the authority of the poet of Ercildoune:

"Plusurs de nos granter ne volent,

Co que del naim dire se solent,
Ki femme Kaherdin dut aimer,
Li naim redut Tristram narrer,
E entusché par grant engin,
Quant il afole Kaherdin;
Pur cest plai e pur cest mal,
Enveiad Tristram Guvernal,
En Engleterre pur Ysolt:
THOMAS ico granter ne volt,
Et si volt par raisun mostrer,
Qu' ico ne put pas esteer," &c.

The tale of Sir Tristrem, as narrated in the Edin. burgh MS., is totally different from the voluminous romance in prose, originally compiled on the same subject by Rusticien de Puise, and analyzed by M. de Tressan; but agrees in every essential particular with the metrical performance just quoted, which is a work of much higher antiquity.

The following attempt to commemorate the Rhymer's poetical fame, and the traditional account of his marvellous return to Fairy Land, being entirely modern, would have been placed with greater propriety among the class of Modern Ballads, had it it not been for its immediate connexion with the first and second parts of the same story.

THOMAS THE RHYMER.

PART THIRD.

WHEN seven years more were come and gono,
Was war through Scotland spread,
And Ruberslaw show'd high Dunyon1
His beacon blazing red.

Then all by bonny Coldingknow,

Pitch'd palliouns took their room, And crested helms, and spears a-rowe, Glanced gaily through the broom.

The Leader, rolling to the Tweed,
Resounds the ensenzie ;3

They roused the deer from Caddenhead,
To distant Torwoodlee.4

The spot is rendered classical by its having given name to the beautiful melody called the Broom o' the Cowdenknows. 3 Ensenzie-War-cry, or gathering word.

4 Torwoodlee and Caddenhead are places in Selkirkshire; both the property of Mr. Pringle of Torwoodles.

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1 Quaighs-Wooden cups, composed of staves hooped toge- 1804, as a noble contrast to the ordinary humility of the ge

ther.

2 See Introduction to this ballad.

nuine ballad diction.-ED.

4 Sec, in the Fabliaux of Monsieur le Grand, elegantly translated by the late Gregory Way, Esq., the tale of the

This stanza was quoted by the Edinburgh Reviewer, of Knight and the Sword. [Vol. ii. p. 3.]

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NOTE B.-P. 574.

The reader is here presented, from an old, and unfortunately an imperfect MS., with the undoubted original of Thomas the Rhymer's intrigue with the Queen of Faery. It will afford great amusement to those who would study the nature of traditional poetry, and the changes effected by oral tradition, to compare this ancient romance with the foregoing ballad. The same incidents are narrated, even the expression is often the same; yet the poems are as different in appearance, as if the older tale had been regularly and systematically modernized by a poet of the present day.

Incipit Prophesia Thomæ de Erseldoun.

In a lande as I was lent,

In the gryking of the day,

Ay alone as I went,

In Huntle bankys me for to play;

I saw the throstyl, and the jay,
Ye mawes movyde of her song,
Ye wodwale sange notes gay,
That al the wod about range.
In that longyng as I lay,
Undir nethe a dern tre,
I was war of a lady gay,
Come rydyng ouyr a fair le :
Zogh I suld sitt to domysday,
With my tong to wrabbe and wry,
Certenly all hyr aray,

It beth neuyer discryuyd for me.
Hyr palfra was dappyll gray,
Sycke on say neuer none;

As the son in somers day,

All abowte that lady schone.
Hyr sadel was of a rewel bone,
A semly syght it was to se,

Bryht with mony a precyous stone,
And compasyd all with crapste;
Stones of oryens, gret plente,
Her hair about her hede it hang,
She rode ouer the farnyle,

A while she blew, a while she sang,
Her girths of nobil silke they were,
Her boculs were of beryl stone,
Sadyll and brydil war

With sylk and sendel about bedone,
Hyr patyrel was of a pall fyne,
And hyr croper of the arase,
Her brydil was of gold fine,

On euery syde forsothe hang bells thre,

Her brydil reynes .

A semly syzt

Crop and patyrel

In every joynt

She led thre grew houndes in a leash,
And ratches cowpled by her ran;
She bar an horn about her halse,
And undir her gyrdil mene flene.
Thomas lay and sa

In the bankes of

He sayd Yonder is Mary of Might,

That bar the child that died for me,

Certes bot I may speke with that lady bright,
Myd my hert will breke in three;

I schal me hye with all my might,
Hyr to mete at Eldyn Tre.
Thomas rathly up her rase,
And ran ouer mountayn hye,
If it he sothe the story says,
He met her euyn at Eldyn Tre.
Thomas knelyd down on his kne
Undir nethe the grenewood spray,
And sayd, Lovely lady, thou rue on me,

Queen of Heaven as you may well be.
But I am a lady of another countrie,
If I be pareld most of prise,

I ride after the wild fee,

My ratches rinnen at my devys.
If thou be pareld most of prise,
And rides a lady in strang foly,
Lovely lady, as thou art wise,
Giue you me leue to lige ye by.
Do way, Thomas, that were foly,
I pray ye, Thomas, late me be,
That sin will fordo all my bewtic.
Lovely ladye, rewe on me,

And euer more I shall with ye dwell,

Here my trowth I plyght to thee,
Where you belieues in heuin or hell.
Thomas, and you myght lyge me by,
Undir nethe this grene wode spray,
Thou would tell full hastely,
That thou had layn by a lady gay.
Lady, mote I lyge by the,
Undir nethe the grene wode tre,
For all the gold in chrystenty,
Suld you neuer be wryede for me.
Man on molde you will me marre,

And yet bot you may haf your will,

Trow you well, Thomas, you cheuyst ye warre;
For all my bewtie wilt you spill.
Down lyghtyd that lady bryzt,
Undir nethe the grene wode spray,
And as ye story sayth full ryzt,
Seuyn tymes by her he lay.

She sayd, Man, you lyst thi play,

What berde in bouyr may dele with thee,

That maries me all this long day;

I pray ye, Thomas, let me be.

Thomas stode up in the stede,
And behelde the lady gay,

Her heyre hang down about hyr hede,
The tane was blak, the other gray,
Her eyn semyt onte before was gray,
Her gay clethyng was all away,
That he before had sene in that stede
Hyr body as blow as ony bede.
Thomas sighede, and sayd, Allas,
Me thynke this a dullfull syght,
That thou art fadyd in the face,
Before you shone as son so bryzt.
Tak thy leue, Thomas, at son and mone,
At gresse, and at euery tre,

This twelmonth sall you with me gone,
Medyl erth you sall not se.

Alas, he seyd, ful wo is me,

I trow my dedes will werke me care,
Jesu, my sole tak to ye,

Whedir so euyr my body sal fare.
She rode furth with all her myzt,
Undir nethe the derne lee,

It was as derke as at midnizt,
And euyr in water unto the kne;
Through the space of days thre,
He herde but swowyng of a flode;
Thomas sayd, Ful wo is me,
Now I spyll for fawte of fode;
To a garden she lede him tyte,
There was fruyte in grete plente,
Peyres and appless ther were rype,
The date and the damese,

The figge and als fylbert tre;

The nyghtyngale bredyng in her neste.

The papigaye about gan fle,

The throstylcock sang wald hate no rest.

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