OLD BALLADS.
It was not the more polished author of Ivanhoe who gave us the unfading picture of the Black Knight, but he who sang of
—a stranger knight whom no man knewe,
He wan the prize eche daye.
His acton it was all of blacke,
His hewberke, and his sheelde,
Ne no man wist whence he did come,
Ne no man knewe where he did gone,
When they came from the feelde.
It was not the “thousand-souled Shakspeare” who gave birth to the story of the pound of flesh; for Shylock is no other than Gernutus the Jew of Venice. We subjoin two stanzas from Percy’s Reliques:—
But we will have a merry jest
For to be talkéd long:
You shall make me a bond (quoth he)
That shall be large and strong.
* * * * *
The bloody Jew now ready is,
With whetted blade in hand;
To spoil the blood of innocent
By forfeit of his bond.
Even the tragedy of Lear was set to the tune of “When flying Fame” before it was known to the stage. Nor will it be unjust to the memory of the good and gifted Goldsmith to say that the Old Harper sang:—
Thus every day I fast and pray,
And ever will doe till I dye;
And gett me to some secrett place,
For soe did hee, and soe will I,—
before the gentle Angelina thought of saying:—
And there forlorn, despairing hid,
I’ll lay me down and die:
’Twas so for me that Edwin did,
And so for him will I.