thering, or confluence, of the people towards the place of sport,) the poet proceeds Ane young man stert into that steid, As cant as ony colt, Ane birken hat upon his heid, With ane bow and ane bolt; Of Peblis to the Play. Another allusion occurs in the twenty-fifth stanza : He fippilit like ane fatherless foal, By the Haly Rude of Peblis, I may nocht rest for greiting. He quissilit and he pypit baith, To mak her blythe that meiting: My bonny heart, how says the sang, Yet," Of Peblis to the Play. It is thus established, that songs were common matters among the peasantry in the earlier half of the fifteenth century; and also that there were, in particular, two songs, now lost, one beginning, "There fure ane man to the holt," and another, "There shall be mirth at our meeting yet." But by far the most valuable illustration of the state of song about the era of King James, [1424-37,] is to be found in a ludicrous vernacular poem, called Cockelby's Sow, which is known, from internal and external evidence, to have been written before the middle of the fifteenth century, although the earliest copy of it is in the Bannatyne Manuscript, dated only 1568. Cockelby's Sow, in language, and style of description, makes a much nearer approach to the mo+ Wood. Went. b dern productions of the Scottish muse, than any other work produced before the days of Semple and Ramsay. On this account, and as it describes a scene of coarse rustic festivity, there is the strongest probability that the names of tunes contained in the following extract, refer expressly to those ballads and songs which were popular at the time when the poem was composed. And his cousin Copyn Cull Sum trottit Tras and Trenass, Sum Perdolly, sum Trolly lolly, Sum, Cok craw thou qll day, Twysbank and Terway, Sum Lincolne, sum Lindsay, Sum Joly Lemman, dawis it not day, Sum Be yon wodsyd singis, Sum Lait lait in evinnynis, Sum, Joly Martene with a mok, Sum, Lulalow lute cok. Sum bakkit, sum beingit, Sum crakkit, sum cringit; Sum movit Most mak revell, Sum Ourfute, sum Orliance, Sum counterfeitit the gyis of Spane, Sum Italy, sum Almaine; And uthir sum of Arragone; Sum The Cane of Tartary, Than all arrayit in a ring, Thay movit in their mad meeting, "Of the airs mentioned in this poem," says Mr Leyden, in his Notes to "The Complaynt of Scotland," "I suspect Twysbank to be the appropriate tune of a song preserved in the Bannatyne MS., which com mences When Tayis bank wes blomit brycht. Owirfute and Orliance are mentioned, in a curious poem on the Laying of a Ghaist,' in the Bannatyne MS., which begins Listis, lordis, I sall you tell. Lutecok is mentioned in Mr Constable's Cantus of the end of the 17th century, as likewise My deir derling, which is there termed My dayes darling."" ' I may further venture to express a conjecture, that Trolly lolly is the same song with Trollee lollee lemman-dow, which is mentioned in the Complaynt of Scotland, 1549, and also with that which Mr Ritson has printed in his "Ancient Songs," under the title of Trolley lollee. Cok craw thou all day, may be the same with the well-known song called "Saw ye my Father?" in which a lover, entering his mistress's bower, gives direction to the cock, as follows: Flee up, flee up, my bonnie gray cock, And craw when it is day; And your neck sall be like the bonnie beaten gowd, Upwards of half a century elapses after the period of Cockelby's Sow, before any other traces of the existence of song are to be found in authentic memoirs. The prologues to Gawin Douglas's translation of Virgil, written at latest in 1513, contain the names or first lines of a few, as follow: On salt stremis walk Dorida and Thetis, Some sang ring sangs,* dances, ledes, and rounds,+ For amorous lays does all the rockis ring: "The ship sails ower the saut faem, My heart is lent upon sae gude a wicht." In the same prologue-the twelfth,-another oc curs: our awin native bird, gentil dow, Singand on her kynd, "I come hither to wow." Could this be a primitive version of the well-known song, "Rob's Jock cam to woo our Jenny," which was nied. Probably songs with which the ring dance was accompa + Rounds is one of the denominations of song enumerated by Fabyan, in regard to a transaction already mentioned. written down in the Bannatyne manuscript anno 1568, or of, "I hae laid a herring in saut ?" Allusion is made, in the thirteenth prologue, to a song which is fortunately preserved: Thereto thir birdis singis in their schawis, As menstralis playis, "The joly day now dawis." The song here mentioned must unquestionably be the same with one which is found in a collection of musical pieces written about the year 1500, out of compliment to Elizabeth, daughter of Edward IV., and consort of Henry VII., and which is preserved in the Fairfax MS. This day day dawes, In a glorious garden grene, Among the flowers that fresh byn; This day day dawes, This fragment is extremely valuable, as proving that, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, there were songs common to the literate classes of both nations. Its tune, at least, seems to have continued a favourite in Scotland, for a long period after the days of Gawin Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld. Dunbar-the cleverest of all the old Scottish poets-who flourished Elizabeth was herself called the White Rose, because she represented the House of York, whose cognizance it was, and might be said metaphorically to have added that flower to the Red Rose of the House of Lancaster, borne by her husband. |