NOTES ... SONGS I-III were copied from the 3rd edition of the Cantus, Songs, and Fancies, to severall Musicall Parts . . . With a brief Introduction to Musick, as it is taught into the Musick-School of Aberdeen &c. Aberdeen, printed by John Forbes. 1682. First edition 1662, second 1666, the first collection of secular music printed in Scotland. For an exact description of the three editions see Stenhouse, pp. xxxiv-xli. Their value is discussed in Dauney's Preliminary Dissertation to the Ancient Scotish Melodies, pp. 20-24 and 28-32; they do not contain a single Scottish melody. The three songs are the 2nd, 4th, and 29th respectively in the Cantus. I LUSTIE MAYE MS. I, 45 a-b; Songs 2 II, 212-213. The poem, which is contained in the Bannatyne MS., was printed as early as 1508 by Chepman and Myllar. The version in the Cantus is modernised. In its original shape it is now easily accessible in James Cranstoun's Poems of Alexander Scott, Scottish Text Society 1896, App. A, and in Henderson's Little Book of Scottish Verse, p. 34. cf. also Ritson, Scotish Songs, vol. I, pp. xli-xliii. II ELORE LO MS. I, 46 a-b; Songs 2 I, 308-309. III WO WORTH THE TIME MS. I, 47a; Songs I, 309–310. Two more ancient and somewhat different copies of this apparently very popular poem are in the Buik of the verie honoourable womane Margarat Robertsoune, Relict of vmqtt Alexander Steuart of Bonskeid. Anno Domini 1630; copied by P. Buchan in his MS. II, fol. 258a and 263b-264a.1 Another I found in a song-book in the Edinburgh Advocates' Library (5. 2. 14) dated 1639 (cf. Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen, vol. cxi, p. 172, n). With the exception of joyes for things in v. iii, l. 2, this is verbatim the same as the version in the Cantus. 1 British Museum, Additional MSS. 29408 and 29409; his extracts from Margaret Robertson's MS. on fol. 256a-269b. In his Introduction to the Ancient Ballads and Songs of the North of Scotland, 1828, Buchan says: "My best acknowledgments are... due to John Richardson, Esq. of Pitfour, Pitfour Castle, Perthshire, for the loan of a curious and interesting old MS. volume of Poems. On the first page of this MS. is written-‘This Buik perteens to a verie honourable womane, Margarat Robertsoune, relict of vmquhile Alexander Steuart of Bonskeid, Anno Domini, 1630.' I am informed she belonged to the Lude family, and the Poems are those referred to by General Stewart of Garth" &c. (p. xv). This General Stewart is David Stewart, who published Sketches of the Character, Manners and Present State of the Highlanders of Scotland, &c., 2 vols. Edinburgh, for Archibald Constable and Co., 1822. He quotes the MS. as a proof of the high standard of culture in the Highlands in the seventeenth century: "There is a manuscript volume preserved in the family of Stewart of Urrard, of 260 pages, of poems, songs, and short tracts, in the Scotch language, written, as is stated on the first page, by Margaret Robertson, daughter of George Robertson of Fascally, and wife of IV O GIN MY LOVE WAS YON RED ROSE A. 11. 1-4 MS. I, 18b, the whole verse MS. II, 54b; Songs 2 II, 4, Johnson's Museum VI, No. 594; as verse ii in Burns's O were my Love (see C.E. III, 279, 493). B. A more complete and probably more ancient version of the song; MS. I, 137b; C.E. III, 494, Scott's Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border III, pp. 382-83 as From Mr. Herd's MS (not verbally and with different arrangement of verses), v. ii in Dick, p. 401. The tune in the Museum is taken from Gow's Fourth Collection of Reels &c., 1800, and is the composition of Alexander Campbell. Stenhouse's remark (p. 509) that only the first four lines are genuine, that is old, is correct; already in Herd a recast had to replace part of the original; ll. 5-8 contain scarcely a single expression or idea congruent with the spirit of folk-song. V THE LEY-RIGG A. MS. I, 128b, II, 67a; the Chorus in C.E. III, 497. The tune Lea-Rig was taken from Oswald's Caledonian Pocket Companion book VIII. p. 20 for Johnson's Museum vol. i, No. 49. The text there connected with it is Alexander Stewart of Bonskeid, dated 1643. [!] It is written in a beautiful hand, and with such correctness, that it might be sent to the press." (vol. II, App. p. xxix). Only two of the pieces contained in it were published by Buchan, viz.: It is a vonder to see how this vorld does goe (p. xvii) and James Heruie (p. xviii). ' frequently attributed to Robert Fergusson.1 Burns reproduces a verse supposed to be older than the version in the Museum (cf. C.E. III, 497); still the possibility remains that this version of Burns's was composed under the influence of another similar song. B. MS. I, 60a, II, 51b; C.E. III, 498. The four-line fragment is the centre of Burns's LeaRig (C.E. III, 284), where he with little alteration uses it as the second half of v. ii; lines 3 and 4 recur also as refrain of the two other verses. The two versions of the text in Herd's MSS. differ considerably from each other. MS. II is more closely related to the text in the Museum than MS. I. It is very probable that Herd got one or even both versions from Fergusson. Still I do not believe the Lea-Rig to be a creation of Fergusson's, who probably only transmitted it. Buchan told Motherwell that the original of Lea-Rig was a song called The Ware-horse. His great-grandmother had sung it. In fact this song is no more As a source of Lea-Rig it is out than a modern vamp.3 of the question. VI WILL YE GO TO FLANDERS MY MALLY MS. I, 56a, II, 48a; Songs2 II, 223; Ritson 1 Cf. Burns's note to My ain kind dearie O, Ch. W. IV, 381; Stenhouse, p. 53; A. B. Grosart, The Works of R. Fergusson, pp. 63–64. 2 Buchan's MS. I, 115b; Motherwell's Burns III, 53. 3 The author of the readable essay on Fergusson and Burns in the Renfrewshire Magazine of December 1846 is of a different opinion, cf. The Works of R. Fergusson, p. 64. VII I HAE LAYEN THREE HERRING A SA'UT MS. I, 17a, II, 53b; Songs 2 II, 225-226; a recast by James Tytler in Johnson's Museum III, No. 244; thence copied by Ritson, Scotish Songs I, 184–185. For the history of the text see Chappell's Introduction to the broadside The Countryman's Delight (Roxburghe Ballads III, 590-92). The line I cannot come every day to woo was known as early as the time of Henry VIII. as a refrain to a wooing-song of somewhat the same gist as the piece in Herd. Both refrain lines are already combined in A Wooing Song of a Yeoman of Kent's Son in the Melismata, Musical Phansies, fitting the Court, Citie and Country Humours. London 1611: I have house and land in Kent, I cannot come every day to woo, &c. The question whether these broadsides originated on Scottish soil cannot now be decided. VIII BLINK OVER THE BURN, SWEET BETTIE MS. I, 57b, II, 49a; Songs2 II, 224; Ritson, Scotish Songs I, 43, with the tune copied from Johnson's Museum I, No. 51; thence Chambers, Songs prior to Burns, p. 285, and Scottish Songs, p. 379. The air was first published in Thomson's Orpheus Caledonius, 1725. In his notes to the Museum Burns mentions two more old verses beginning: Blink over the burn, sweet Bettie (see Ch. W. IV, 382), which are |