F
Kinloch MSS, III, 133.
1
O Errol is a bonny place,
And stands upon yon plane,
But the lady lost the rights o it
Yestreen or she came hame.
2
O Erroll is a bonny place,
And lyes forenent the sun,
And the apples they grow red and white,
And peers o bonny green.
3
‘I nedna wash my apron,
Nor hing it on the door;
But I may tuck my petticoat,
Hangs even down before.
4
‘Oh, Erroll, Erroll,
Oh, Erroll if ye ken,
Why should I love Erroll,
Or any of his men?’
5
She’s turned her right and round about,
Poured out a glass o wine;
Says, I will drink to my true love,
He’ll drink to me again.
6
O Erroll stud into the fleer,
He was an angry man:
‘See here it is a good gray-hun,
We’ll try what is the run.’
7
Then Erroll stud into the fleer,
Steered neither ee nor bree,
Till that he saw his good gray-hun
Was burst and going free.
8
‘But ye are Kate Carnegie,’ he said,
‘And I am Sir Gilbert Hay;
I’se gar your father sell Kinnaird,
Your tocher-good to pay.’
9
Now she is on to Edinburgh,
A’ for to use the law,
And brave Erroll has followed her,
His yellow locks to sheu.
10
Out and spak her sister Jean,
And an angry woman was she;
‘If I were lady of Erroll,
And hed as fair a face,
I would no go to Edinburgh,
My good lord to disgrace.’
A. a.
234. toucher one.
26. May have been a burden.
b.
Ballad of Gilbert, Earl of Errol, and Lady Catherine Carnegie
. . . . . . .
13
Up spake Lord Carnegie,
’ O Kate, what do you think?
We’ll beguile the Earl of Errol,
As long as he’s in drink.’
14
‘O what need you beguile him?
Or what would you do than?
For I can easy vow and testify
Lord Errol’s not a man.
12
‘You need not wash my petticoat
And hang it at the door;
For it’s baith side and wide enough,
And hangs even down before.
11
‘You need not wash my apron
And hang it on a pin;
For I’m as leil a maiden
As first when I went in.’
15
Down came the Earl of Errol,
As swift as any roe:
‘Come harness me my Irish coach,
To Edinburgh I go.’
16
And when he came to Edinburgh,
A ganging through the green,
Full four-and-twenty maidens
A’ dancing there were seen.
17
And there were fifteen maidens
All dancing in a row,
And the fairest and the fattest
To prove that she must go.
18
He’s taen his Peggy by the hand,
And led her through the green,
And twenty times he’s kissed her,
Before his lady’s een.
19
He’s taen his Peggy by the hand,
And led her through the hall,
And twenty times he’s kissed her,
Before the nobles all.
He’s taen his Peggy by the hand,
And led her to a room,
And gave her a cup of claret wine,
And syne a bed of down.
201,2
‘Stand up, stand up, my Peggy,
Stand up, and think na shame,
Na hide your face within your hand,
On me be all the blame.
‘For you shall have a thousand pounds
As soon as it is won,
203,4
And you shall have ten thousand pounds
If you bear to me a son.’
21
He kept his Peggy in a room
Full nine months and a day,
And at the very nine months’ end
She bore a son so gay.
As they were all at dinner sat,
And merrily went the can,
Up spake the noble Earl of Perth,
‘Kate, what ails you at your man?’
‘Oh, all the lands and earldom
Are now to ruin gone,
For I can easy vow and testify
He’ll never get a son.’
241–4
‘Ye lie, ye lie, you filthy jade,
So loud I hear you lie!
For there sits Lord Errol’s son,
Upon his mither’s knee.’
22
‘As you are Kate Carnegie
And I Sir Gilbert Hay,
I’ll gar your father sell his land
Your tocher for to pay.’
23
‘To gar my father sell his land
I’m sure would be a sin,
For to tocher any John Sheephead
Who could neer a tocher win.’
251–4
‘You may take hame your daughter Kate,
And set her in a glen,
For Lord Errol cannot please her,
Nor none of Errol’s men.
‘You may provide a knife and fork,
A trencher and a spoon,
A little boy to call her,
Come to your dinner, dame;
A little boy to call her
Till seven years are done.’
B.
Written in long lines, without division into stanzas; carelessly and in a bad hand, like other transcripts by Skene. The frequent gaps (of which only one is indicated, 54) make the division here adopted doubtful in some cases.
The burden is given at the end only, and is badly corrupted. 1. the Darton all. 3. Pearting?
74. hir all. Corrupted? hir, or him, at?
101. tour end: see 241–2.
153, 163. Earl.
202. gay ladies.
234. Corrupted? some malediction on the lady?
272. gaire is, I suppose, gear.
D. b.
Burden.
1. The wally o ‘t, the wally o ‘t.
3. the ranting o ‘t.
4. Our lady lies alane.
13. at it.
31. It’s I.
41. As sure as you’re Jean.
42. And I am.
43. I’ll cause.
51. To cause.
52. I think would be.
53. give to such a rogue as you.
54. Who never could it win.
61. So he must go.
62. Amang the nobles a’.
63. And there before good witnesses.
72. was called Miss Anne.
93. she says wanting.
8–12
A servant girl there was found out,
On whom to show his skill;
He gave to her a hundred pounds,
To purchase her good-will.
And still he cried, Look up, Peggy,
Look up, and think no shame,
And you shall have your hundred pounds
Before I lay you down.
Now he has lain him down wi her,
A hundred pounds in pawn,
And all the noblemen cried out
That Errol is a man.
‘Tak hame your daughter,’ Errol said,
‘And tak her to a glen,
For Errol canna pleasure her,
Nor can no other man.’
c.
Burden.
1. And the.
3. And the thing we.
4. Is, Errol’s na a man.
11, 21. O Errol is.
12. Into the simmer time.
13. The apples they grow.
14. And the pears they grow green.
34. bore the.
41. Tho your name be Dame Cathrine Carnegie.
42. mine Sir Gilbert.
43. sell Kinnaird.
44. tocher gude to.
51. If ye gar my father sell Kinnaird.
52. ‘T will be a crying.
53,4. To tocher onie weary dwrf, That canna tocher win.
61. The lady is.
62. A’ for.
64. His ainsell.
71. O up bespak.
72. Lady Ann.
73. she says wanting.
After 7, two stanzas which are clearly a spurious interpolation.
81. Errol has got (But wanting).
83. has chosen a weel-faurd may.
84. Come. After 8 (==10):
‘Look up, look up, my weel-faurd may,
Look up, and think na shame;
I’ll gie to thee five hundred merk
To bear to me a son.’
91. He’s tane the lassie by the han.
93. there wanting.
94. Afore.
After 9:
When they war laid in the proof-bed,
And a’ the lords looking on,
Then a’ the fifteen vowd and swore
That Errol was a man.
111. But they hae keepit this lassie.
113. And at the end o nine lang months.
114. A son to him she bare.
After 11:
And there was three thairbut, thairbut,
And there was three thairben,
And three looking oure the window hie,
Crying, Errol’s provd a man!
And whan the word gaed thro the toun,
The sentry gied a cry,
‘O fair befa you, Errol, now!
For ye hae won the day.’
‘O I’ll tak off my robes o silk,
And fling them oure the wa,
And I’ll gae maiden hame again,
Awa, Errol, awa!’
121. Sir Carnegie.
122. till the glen.
123. he wanting.
124. nane o Errol’s.
(12 is found in Kinloch’s MSS, VII, 95, with Sir Carnegie beginning the line.)
After 12:
And ilka day her plate was laid,
Bot an a siller spune,
And three times cried oure Errol’s yett,
‘Lady Errol, come and dine.’
Kinloch gives the following as a variant. It is found in Kinloch’s MSS, VII, 95:
Seven years the trencher sat,
And seven years the spune;
Seven years the servant cried,
‘Lady Errol, come and dine.’
Burden, at the end. 3. ye ca. 4. Lady Errol lies her leen.
E.
Sharpe made these changes in his Ballad Book:
34. the toss.
42. He’s led her oer the green.
43. he kist.
71. Your name is.
72. And I’m.
123. shall not.
F.
11, 21, 61. Oh.
232
RICHIE STORY
A. ‘Ritchie Storie,’ Motherwell’s MS., p. 426.
B. Skene MS., p. 96.
C. a. ‘Richie Story,’ “Scotch Ballads, Materials for Border Minstrelsy,” No 65, MS. of Thomas Wilkie, 1813–15, p. 53, Abbotsford. b. ‘Ritchie’s Tory Laddie,’ Campbell MSS, II, 116.
D. ‘Richy Story,’ the late Mr Robert White’s papers.
E. ‘Richard Storie,’ “Scotch Ballads, Materials for Border Minstrelsy,” No 76, Abbotsford.
F. a. ‘Richie Storie,’ Sharpe’s Ballad Book, 1823, p. 95. b. ‘Richie Storrie,’ Nimmo, Songs and Ballads of Clydesdale, 1882, p. 211.
G. a. ‘Richard Storry,’ Kinloch MSS, I, 203. b. ‘Richie Tory,’ Gibb MS., p. 77. c. ‘Ritchie’s Lady,’ Murison MS., p. 82. d. ‘Richie’s Lady,’ Christie’s Traditional Ballad Airs, I, 72. e. Kinloch MSS, VII, 263, a fragment. f. ‘The Earl of Winton’s Daughter,’ Buchan’s MSS, I, 87.
H. The Scots Magazine, 1803, LXV, 253, one stanza.
The youngest (eldest, A) and fairest of the daughters of the Earl of Wigton, A, F (bonniest of his sisters, E), has fallen in love with her footman, Richie Story (Tory). Richie brings her a letter from a nobleman who desires to be her suitor; the Earl of Hume, A, B, F, G a, d, e; the Earl of Hume’s son, D; the Earl of Aboyne, E; of Cumbernauld, G b; of Mohun, G c; of Wemyss, G f and a variant of E; the Earls of Hume and Skimmerjim, Skimmerham (Kimmerghame), C. The lady has made a vow, and will keep it, to marry none but Richie. Richie deprecates; he has nothing to maintain her with; she is ready to descend to the lowest fortune. (In several versions she has enough of her own. Hunten Tour and Tillebarn and the House of Athol are hers, B; Musselburgh, C; the House of Athol and Taranadie, G d; Blair-in-Athol and Dunkeld, H.) Asked by her sister, by Richie, or by some one else, whether she is not sorry to have left Cumbernauld (Castle Norry, G f) to follow a footman, she answers that there is no reason, she has her heart’s desire and the lot that was ordained her. As she goes up the Parliament close, rides through Edinburgh town, Glasgow city (London city, C b, absurdly), she is greeted by many a lord, but few or none of them thought she was a footman’s lady. Arrived at the domicile of the Storys, her good-mother bids her, gars her, kilt up her coats and muck the byres with Richie.
F, G, are not satisfied with this conclusion. The footman is really a lover in disguise, the Earl of Hume or of Cumbernauld, F, G a b. (G b 2 spoils the plot by making the Earl of Hume write to the lady that he will be her footman-laddie.) Four-and-twenty gentlemen welcome the bride at Ritchie’s gates, or elsewhere, and she blesses the day that she was Richie’s lady. This is incontestably a later invention.
G f, which is otherwise embellished, goes a good step beyond G a-e. Richie is an Englishman and takes the lady to London. ‘Madam’ has left her kindred to gang with a servant; he has ‘left the sceptre and the crown’ her servant for to be; little she knew that her waiting-man was England’s royal king.
“Lillias Fleming, second daughter of John, Earl of Wigton by his wife Jane Drummond (a daughter of the Earl of Perth), did elope with and marry one of her father’s servants, named Richard Storry. In 1673, she, with consent of her husband, resigned her portion, consisting of the five-merk land of Smythson, etc., in the barony of Lenzie, into the hands of her brother, Lieutenant-Colonel Fleming. The Fleming family afterwards procured for Richie a situation in the Custom-House.” So Hunter, Biggar and the House of Fleming, p. 555, and, in part, Douglas’s Peerage, where, however, Lady Lillias is said to have married Richard Storry, “Esq.:” ed. Wood, II, 616.
Douglas notes that “John, third Earl of Wigton, ... had a charter of the lordship of Cumbernauld, 1st February, 1634.” This place (Comarnad, Campernadie, etc., B, D, G a, c, d) is in Dumbartonshire. In F 11 it is attributed to the young Earl of Hume, and the disguised lover is the Earl of Cumbernauld in G b.
The lady, ready for any extremity, says in F 6 that she will lie ayont a dyke (on the other side of a wall), in E 6 sit below the dyke, in D 5 sit aneath the duke, and that she will be at Richie’s command at all times. This matter was not understood by the reciter of B, and in B 7 the lady is made to say, We will go to sea, I’ll sit upon the deck (and be your servant, as in the other cases). In A the difficulty, such as it is, seems to have been evaded, and we read, 6, I’ll live whereer you please (and be ready at your call late or early).
For the relation of this ballad to ‘Huntingtower’ and ‘The Duke of Athol,’ see an appendix.