The Nut-Brown Mayd.

'Ye shall not nede farther to drede;
I wyll not dysparàge

You, (God defend!) syth ye descend
Of so grete a lynàge.

Nowe undyrstande; to Westmarlande,
Which is myne herytage,

I wyll you brynge; and with a rynge
By way of maryage

I wyll you take, and lady make,
As shortely as I can :
Thus have you won an erlys son
And not a banyshed man.'

We retain the reading as we find it in Arnold. In the
several editions of Arnold, there are also some variations,
but none of them are of much importance; they are all
given in a small reprint of the ballad, published in 1836,
by Mr. Pickering: from one of them, Percy appears to have
copied the two lines inserted above. In this reprint, the
text is copied from the earliest edition of Arnold, "sup-
posed"
to have been printed about 1502; the variations
are, chiefly, from the edition of 1521. The orthography
varies with the various editions; we have, generally, fol-
lowed Percy. As an example, we may observe, that in
Arnold, the word which occurs so frequently is spelt "ban-
nisshed."

Creswick del.

EMPION.

We copy this ballad from the "Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border;" where it is given "chiefly" from "Mrs. Brown's MS." with "corrections from a recited fragment." Sir Walter Scott, in some prefatory remarks, refers to several traditionary anecdotes, still current in Scotland and on the borders, concerning huge and poisonous snakes, or "worms," destroyed by gallant knights in the olden time. The manor of Sockburne, in the bishopric of Durham, is held of the bishop by the service of presenting to him on his first entrance into his diocese, an antique sword or falchion, to commemorate the slaying of a monstrous crea

ture that devoured men, women, and children,-by Sir John Conyers, who received the manor as a reward for his bravery. Pollard's lands, near Bishop

Auckland, are held by a similar tenure; and the founder of the noble family of Somerville is said to have performed a deed as wonderful - by thrusting down the throat of the snake a burning peat, "bedabbed with pitch, rosett, and brimstone." A rude sculpture carved above the entrance to the ancient church at Linton in Roxburghshire, is said to represent this exploit; of which "the vulgar tell us,"

The wode Laird of Lariestoun

Slew the wode worm of Wormiestoune,

And wan all Lintoun parochine.

The story of the "Lambton worm," as recorded in Surtees' "History of Durham," is still more remarkable. The heir of Lambton, profanely fishing on a sabbath-day, hooked a small worm or elf, which he carelessly threw into a well; in process of time it grew to a huge size, and made prey of the whole country, levying a contribution daily of "nine cows' milk," and, in default of payment, devouring man and beast. The heir, who had wrought the mischief, returning from the crusades, determined to destroy it; and, by the advice of a witch, or wise woman, clad himself in a coat of mail studded with razor blades; selecting as the scene of battle the middle of a river, so that as fast as the worm was cut to pieces the stream carried away the dissevered parts, and thus prevented their subsequent adhesion. The knight had promised, however, that he would slay the first living thing that met him after his victory; this chanced to be his father, and, as he refused to keep his vow, it was decreed that no -chief of his family should die in his bed for nine generations. Popular tradition continues to point out the scene of the encounter. Stories of men and women transformed into monsters are sufficiently numerous, and have been found among every people. Many such exist in England, in Scotland, and in Ireland; in the latter country they are invariably supposed to occupy lakes of unfathomed depth, out of which they occasionally arise and make excursions among adjacent mountains, bearing with them to their "palaces" beneath the waters, the cattle of some unhappy "neighbour," and not unfrequently the neighbour himself. The origin of the superstition is believed to have been Danish. The traditions of Denmark are full of such romances; and it is more than probable, that it may have been introduced, by its sea-kings, into these islands. "The ballad of Kempion," writes Sir Walter Scott, "seems, from the names of the personages and the nature of the adventure, to have been an old metrical romance

degraded into a ballad by the lapse of time and the corruption of reciters." The

6

allusion to the "arblast bow" would seem

to affix the composition to a remote date. * Two ballads which relate to a similar incident have been preserved; one entitled "Kemp Owyne," by Mr. Motherwell, and another "The Laidly Worm of Spindleston-Heugh," affirmed to have been composed, in 1270, by Duncan Frazier, "living

on Cheviot," but supposed to have been, at least re-written, by Mr. Robert Lambe, vicar of Norham. In "Kemp Owyne," dove Isabel' is transformed into a monster by her step-mother, and doomed to retain her savage form

Till Kemp Owyne come ower the sea

And borrow her with kisses three.

The three kisses are of course given; when, instead of the beast "whose breath was strang, whose hair was lang,"→

Her breath was sweet, her hair grew short,
And twisted nane about the tree;

And, smilingly, she came about,

As fair a woman as fair could be.

The ballad of the "Laidley (loathsome) Worm" was no doubt greatly altered by Mr. Lambe, but there is evidence that the story was "generally known in Northumberland" long before he printed the version attributed to Duncan Frazier; and it is to be regretted that he did not communicate it as he received it-stript of its "amendments and enlargements." In this ballad, the daughter of the King of Bamborough is metamorphosed by her step-mother, and restored to her natural shape by her brother Childy Wynd," who avenges the wrong done to his sister by converting the foul witch into a toad. As in "Kempion," and "Kemp Owyne," the restoration to humanity is effected by "kisses three: "

66

'O, quit thy sword and bend thy bow,

And give me kisses three;

For though I am a poisonous worm,
No hurt I'll do to thee.

O, quit thy sword and bend thy bow,

And give me kisses three;

If I'm not won, ere the sun goes down,
Won I shall never be.'

He quitted his sword and bent his bow,

And gave her kisses three;

She crept into. a hole a worm,

But out stept a lady.

Percy prints the ballad of the "Witch of Wokey," written in 1748, by the ingenious

* The arbalast and arrow here engraved are copied from specimens of the time of Elizabeth, in the possession of Sir Samuel Meyrick, at Goodrich Court, and have been engraved in Skelton's "Illustrations of Ancient Arms and Armour." The string of the arbalast, or arbalist, was drawn to the notch in the centre by means of a wheel, which was usually hung to the girdle of the archer.