COSPATRICK
The Text is that of Scott’s Minstrelsy (1802). It was ‘taken down from the recitation of a lady’ (his mother’s sister, Miss Christian Rutherford), and collated with a copy in the Tytler-Brown MS. The ballad is also called Gil Brenton, Lord Dingwall, Bangwell, Bengwill, or Brangwill, Bothwell, etc.
The Story is a great favourite, not only in Scandinavian ballads, but also in all northern literature. The magical agency of bed, blankets, sheets, and sword, is elsewhere extended to a chair, a stepping-stone by the bedside (see the Boy and the Mantle, First Series, p. 119), or the Billie Blin (see Young Bekie, First Series, pp. 6, 7, and Willie’s Lady, p. 19). The Norwegian tale of Aase and the Prince is known to English readers in Dasent’s Annie the Goosegirl. The Prince is possessed of a stepping-stone by his bedside, which answers his question night and morning, and enables him to detect the supposititious bride. See also Jamieson’s translation of Ingefred and Gudrunè, in Illustrations of Northern Antiquities, p. 340.