K
a. From Mrs Helena Titus Brown of New York. b. From Miss Emma A. Clinch of New York. Derived, 1820, or a little later, a directly, b indirectly, from the singing of Miss Phœbe Wood, Huntington, Long Island, and perhaps learned from English soldiers there stationed during the Revolutionary war.
* * * * * *
1
‘Go bring me down my high-heeled shoes,
Made of the Spanish leather,
And I’ll take off my low-heeled shoes,
And away we’ll go together.’
Lumpy dumpy linky dinky day
Lumpy dumpy linky dinky daddy
2
They brought her down her high-heeled shoes,
Made of the Spanish leather,
And she took off her low-heeled shoes,
And away they went together.
3
And when Lord Garrick he got there,
Inquiring for his lady,
Then up steps his best friend:
‘She’s gone with a gipsy laddie.’
4
‘Go saddle me my bonny brown,
For the grey is not so speedy,
And away we’ll go to the Misty Mount,
And overtake my lady.’
5
They saddled him his bonny brown,
For the grey was not so speedy,
And away they went to the Misty Mount,
And overtook his lady.
6
And when Lord Garrick he got there,
’Twas in the morning early,
And there he found his lady fair,
And she was wet and weary.
7
‘And it’s fare you well, my dearest dear,
And it’s fare you well for ever,
And if you don’t go with me now,
Don’t let me see you never.’
A.
Variations of Finlay, II, 39 ff.
Inserted after 2:
‘O come with me,’ says Johnie Faw,
‘O come with me, my dearie;
For I vow and I swear, by the hilt of my sword,
That your lord shall nae mair come near ye.’
Then she gied them the beer and the wine,
And they gied her the ginger;
But she gied them a far better thing,
The goud ring aff her finger.
42. Wi my.
43. But this.
63. For I vow and I swear, by the fan in my hand.
72. And wanting.
92. Otherwise: The brown was neer sae ready.
103. but ane.
104. For a.
Herd has in 103,4 but ane, For. Pinkerton follows Herd, with changes of his own in 1, 10, and the omission of 7. The copy in Johnson’s Museum is Herd’s, with changes: in 103,4, are a’ put down for ane, The Earl of Cassilis’ lady. Ritson follows Ramsay, except that in 62 he has And I’ll, found in Herd; perhaps also in some edition of the Tea-Table Miscellany.
B. a.
“Some lines have been omitted on account of their indelicacy:” p. 308 b. The reference is no doubt to a stanza corresponding to A 7, or perhaps to a passage like 5–7.
b.
Only 1, 2, 5, 10–13, are preserved.
11. gipsies cam to oor ha-door.
14. doon stairs cam oor gay leddie.
22. afore.
23. An whan they.
24. cuist the glamour.
51. my gay mantle.
52. me my.
53. For I maun leave my guid lord at hame.
54. An follow the.
101. They travelld east, they travelld wast.
102. They travelld.
103. to the.
104. By that time she.
111. I crost this.
112. An my guid man.
113. Noo I maun put.
114. An follow.
121. Whan her guid lord cam hame at nicht.
122. He spierd for his gay.
123. The tane she cried an the ither replied.
124. She’s aff.
131. the brown, he said.
132. The black neer rides.
133. For I.
134. Till I’ve brought back.
C.
41. Originally plaid was written for cloak; evidently by accidental anticipation.
53. fit altered perhaps from fut; printed fit.
Motherwell has made several verbal changes in printing, and has inserted three stanzas to fill out the ballad.
After 3,
‘Come with me, my bonnie Jeanie Faw,
O come with me, my dearie;
For I do swear, by the head o my spear,
Thy gude lord’ll nae mair come near thee.’
After 7,
‘I’ll go to bed,’ the lady she said,
‘I’ll go to bed to my dearie;
For I do swear, by the fan in my hand,
That my lord shall nae mair come near me.
‘I’ll mak a hap,’ the lady she said,
‘I’ll mak a hap to my dearie,
And he’s get a’ this petticoat gaes round,
And my lord shall nae mair come near me.’
E.
12, 13. After 9 of A, says Finlay, some copies insert:
And he’s rode east, and he’s rode west,
Till he came near Kirkaldy;
There he met a packman-lad,
And speir’d for his fair lady.
‘O cam ye east? or cam ye west?
Or cam ye through Kirkaldy?
O saw na ye a bonny lass,
Following the gypsie laddie?’
‘I cam na east, I cam na west,
Nor cam I through Kirkaldy;
But the bonniest lass that eer I saw
Was following the gypsie laddie!’
See also G 7.
G. a.
43. br oges.
b.
In stanzas of eight lines.
11. There were.
22. With her.
23. fair wanting.
24. They cast the glamer over her.
32. Which was of the belinger.
34. ’Twas wanting.
42. They were.
43. brogues.
44. laddy, and always.
61. me wanting.
63. That I may go and seek.
64. Who’s.
74. Following a.
81. all the summer.
83. espied.
84. and wet.
91. O why.
93. your own.
101. lands.
103. will I remain.
111. There were.
112. They were.
113. all in.
H.
21. the lawyer did.
J. b.
1.
The gypsy came tripping over the lea,
The gypsy he sang boldly;
He sang till he made the merry woods ring,
And he charmed the heart of the lady.
Order: 1, 5, 6, 2, 3.
2 (as 4).
The lord came home that self-same night,
Inquired for his lady;
The merry maid made him this reply,
‘She’s gone with the gypsy Davy.’
3 (as 5).
‘O bring me out the blackest steed;
The brown one’s not so speedy;
I’ll ride all day, and I’ll ride all night,
Till I overtake my lady.’
4 (as 7).
He rode along by the river-side,
The water was black and rily,
. . . . . . .
. . . . . .
5 (as 2).
51,2. Will you.
53. Will you forsake your own wedded lord.
6 (as 3).
62. And I’ll.
63. I will forsake my own wedded lord.
64. And go with the gypsy Davy.
7. Wanting.
b 6. I lay last night. The rest wanting.
b 8. Puts the question whether she will go back.
b 9. I lay last night. The rest wanting.
K. a.
The order as delivered was 3, 1, 2, etc., and the high-heeled shoes were attributed to Lord Garrick. Him, his, he in 2 have been changed to her, her, she. But a further change should be made for sense, in 1, 2: the lady should take off her high-heeled shoes and put on her low-heeled shoes; see G 4, I 8.
Burden given also:
Lal dee dumpy dinky diddle dah day
b. Burden:
Rump a dump a dink a dink a day
Rump a dump a dink a dink a dady.
Or,
Rink a dink a dink a dink a day
Rink a dink a dink a dink a day dee.
Order as in a.
11. fetch me.
13. And take away.
21. fetched him down his.
23. And they took away his.
31. got home.
34. with the.
41. Go fetch me out.
43. And we’ll away to.
44. To for And.
51. They fetched him out.
54. To overtake my.
63. lady bright.
73. you won’t.
201
BESSY BELL AND MARY GRAY
a. Sharpe’s Ballad Book, 1823, p. 62. b. Lyle’s Ancient Ballads and Songs, 1827, p. 160, “collated from the singing of two aged persons, one of them a native of Perthshire.” c. Scott’s Minstrelsy, 1833, I, 45, two stanzas.
A squib on the birth of the Chevalier St George, beginning
Bessy Bell and Mary Grey,
Those famous bonny lasses,
shows that this little ballad, or song, was very well known in the last years of the seventeenth century.[[51]] The first stanza was made by Ramsay the beginning of a song of his own, and stands thus in Ramsay’s Poems, Edinburgh, 1721, p. 80:[[52]]
O Bessy Bell and Mary Gray,
They are twa bonny lasses;
They biggd a bower on yon Burn-brae,
And theekd it oer wi rashes.
Cunningham, Songs of Scotland, III, 60, gives, as recited to him by Sir Walter Scott, four stanzas which are simply a with ‘Lyndoch brae’ substituted in the third for Sharpe’s ‘Stronach haugh.’ ‘Dranoch haugh,’ nearly as in b, is, as will presently appear, the right reading. Sharpe’s third stanza, with the absurd variation of royal kin, occurs in a letter of his of the date November 25, 1811 (Letters, ed. Allardyce, I, 504), and is printed in the Musical Museum, IV, *203, ed. 1853.
In the course of a series of letters concerning the ballad in The Scotsman (newspaper), August 30 to September 8, 1886, several verses are cited with trivial variations from the texts here given.
‘Bessy Bell’ was made into this nursery-song in England (Halliwell’s Nursery Rhymes of England, 1874, p. 246, No 484):
Bessy Bell and Mary Gray,
They were two bonny lasses;
They built their house upon the lea,
And covered it with rashes.
Bessy kept the garden-gate,
And Mary kept the pantry;
Bessy always had to wait,
While Mary lived in plenty.
The most important document relating to Bessy Bell and Mary Gray is a letter written June 21, 1781, by Major Barry, then proprietor of Lednock, and printed in the Transactions of the Society of the Antiquaries of Scotland, II, 108, 1822.[[53]]
“When I came first to Lednock,” says Major Barry, “I was shewn in a part of my ground (called the Dranoch-haugh) an heap of stones almost covered with briers, thorns and fern, which they assured me was the burial place of Bessie Bell and Mary Gray.
“The tradition of the country relating to these ladys is, that Mary Gray’s father was laird of Lednock and Bessie Bell’s of Kinvaid, a place in this neighbourhood; that they were both very handsome, and an intimate friendship subsisted between them; that while Miss Bell was on a visit to Miss Gray, the plague broke out, in the year 1666; in order to avoid which they built themselves a bower about three quarters of a mile west from Lednock House, in a very retired and romantic place called Burn-braes, on the side of Brauchie-burn. Here they lived for some time; but the plague raging with great fury, they caught the infection, it is said, from a young gentleman who was in love with them both. He used to bring them their provision. They died in this bower, and were buried in the Dranoch-haugh, at the foot of a brae of the same name, and near to the bank of the river Almond. The burial-place lies about half a mile west from the present house of Lednock.[[54]]
“I have removed all the rubbish from this little spot of classic ground, inclosed it with a wall, planted it round with flowering shrubs, made up the grave double, and fixed a stone in the wall, on which is engraved the names of Bessie Bell and Mary [Gray].”
The estate passed by purchase to Thomas Graham, afterwards Lord Lynedoch, who replaced the wall, which had become dilapidated in the course of half a century, with a stone parapet and iron railing, and covered the grave with a slab inscribed, “They lived, they loved, they died.” This slab is now hidden under a cairn of stones raised by successive pilgrims.
Major Barry’s date of 1666 should be put back twenty years. Perth and the neighborhood (Lednock is seven miles distant) were fearfully ravaged by the plague in 1645 and a year or two following. Three thousand people are said to have perished. Scotland escaped the pestilence of 1665–6.[[55]]
The young gentleman who is said to have brought food to Bessy and Mary is sometimes described as the lover of both, sometimes as the lover of one of the pair. Pennant says that the ballad was “composed by a lover deeply stricken with the charms of both.” In the course of tradition, the lover is said to have perished with the young women, which we might expect to happen if he brought the contagion to the bower. But this lover, who ought to have had his place in the song, appears only in tradition, and his reality may be called in question. It is not rational that the young women should seclude themselves to avoid the pest and then take the risk of the visits of a person from the seat of the infection.[[56]] To be sure it may be doubted, notwithstanding the tenor of the ballad, whether the retirement of these young ladies was voluntary, or at least whether they had not taken the plague before they removed to their bower. In that case the risk would have been for the lover, and would have been no more than he might naturally assume.[[57]]
1
O Bessie Bell and Mary Gray,
They war twa bonnie lasses;
They bigget a bower on yon burn-brae,
And theekit it oer wi rashes.
2
They theekit it oer wi rashes green,
They theekit it oer wi heather;
But the pest cam frae the burrows-town,
And slew them baith thegither.
3
They thought to lye in Methven kirk-yard,
Amang their noble kin;
But they maun lye in Stronach haugh,
To biek forenent the sin.
4
And Bessy Bell and Mary Gray,
They war twa bonnie lasses;
They biggit a bower on yon burn-brae,
And theekit it oer wi rashes.
a.
In eight-line stanzas.
b.
13. house for bower.
23. Till the: frae the neibrin.
24. An streekit.
31. They were na buried in.
32. Amang the rest o their kin.
33. they were buried by Dornoch-haugh.
34. On the bent before.
41. Sing for And.
43. Wha for They.
44. wi thrashes.
c.
11. O wanting.
2. Wanting.
31. They wadna rest in Methvin kirk.
32. gentle kin.
33. But they wad lie in Lednoch braes.
34. beek against.
4. Wanting.
202
THE BATTLE OF PHILIPHAUGH
Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, III, 153, 1803, II, 166, 1833; “preserved by tradition in Selkirkshire.”
After six brilliant victories, at Tipper-muir, Aberdeen, Inverlochy, Auldearn, Alford, Kilsyth, gained in less than a year, September 1, 1644–August 15, 1645, Montrose was surprised by David Leslie at Philiphaugh, September 13 following, and his army cut to pieces or dispersed. This army, consisting of only five hundred Irish foot and twelve hundred Scottish horse, the last all gentry, was lying at Philiphaugh, a meadow on the west side of the Ettrick, and at Selkirk, on and above the opposite bank. Leslie came down from the north with four thousand cavalry and some infantry, was less than four miles from Selkirk the night of the twelfth, and on the morrow, favored by a heavy mist, had advanced to about half a mile’s distance before his approach was reported. A hundred and fifty of Montrose’s horse received and repulsed two charges of greatly superior numbers; the rest stood off and presently took to flight. The foot remained firm. Two thousand of Leslie’s horse crossed the river and got into Montrose’s rear, and made resistance vain. Montrose and a few friends hewed their way through the enemy.[[58]]
1. Harehead wood is at the western end of the plain of Philiphaugh.
2, 3. Leslie had come up from Berwick along the eastern coast as far as Tranent, and then suddenly turned south. His numbers are put too low, and Montrose’s, in 10, about nine times too high.
4. The Shaw burn is a small stream that flows into the Ettrick from the south, a little north of the town.
5. Lingly burn falls into the Ettrick from the north, a little above the Shaw burn.
The ‘aged father,’ 6, to accept a tradition reported by Sir Walter Scott, was one “Brydone, ancestor to several families in the parish of Ettrick.” This is probably the personage elsewhere called Will, upon whose advice Leslie (according to tradition again) “sent a strong body of horse over a dip in the bank that separated his advanced guard from the river Ettrick, and still known as “Will’s Nick,” with instructions to follow their guide up Netley burn, wheel to the left round Linglee hill, and then fall upon the flank of Montrose’s army at Philiphaugh.”[[59]] It does not appear that Leslie adopted that portion of the aged father’s recommendation which is conveyed in stanzas 11, 12, notwithstanding the venerable man’s unusual experience, which, as Scott points out, extended from Solway Moss, 1542, to Dunbar, where, in 1650, five years after Philiphaugh, Leslie was defeated by Cromwell.
Other pieces of popular verse relating, in part or wholly, to Montrose are ‘The Gallant Grahams,’ Roxburghe collection, III, 380, Douce, III, 39 back, Ebsworth, Roxburghe Ballads, VI, 587, Scott’s Minstrelsy, III, 371, 1803, II, 183, 1833; ‘The Haughs o Cromdale,’ Ritson’s Scotish Songs, 1794, II, 40, Johnson’s Museum, No 488, Maidment’s Scotish Ballads and Songs, 1868, I, 299, Hogg’s Jacobite Relics, I, 157 ff; ‘The Battle of Alford,’ Laing’s Thistle of Scotland, p. 68.
1
On Philiphaugh a fray began,
At Hairheadwood it ended;
The Scots outoer the Græmes they ran,
Sae merrily they bended.
2
Sir David frae the Border came,
Wi heart an hand came he;
Wi him three thousand bonny Scots,
To bear him company.
3
Wi him three thousand valiant men,
A noble sight to see!
A cloud o mist them weel conceald,
As close as eer might be.
4
When they came to the Shaw burn,
Said he, Sae weel we frame,
I think it is convenient
That we should sing a psalm.
5
When they came to the Lingly burn,
As daylight did appear,
They spy’d an aged father,
And he did draw them near.
6
‘Come hither, aged father,’
Sir David he did cry,
‘And tell me where Montrose lies,
With all his great army.’
7
‘But first you must come tell to me,
If friends or foes you be;
I fear you are Montrose’s men,
Come frae the north country.’
8
‘No, we are nane o Montrose’s men,
Nor eer intend to be;
I am Sir David Lesly,
That’s speaking unto thee.’
9
‘If you’re Sir David Lesly,
As I think weel ye be,
I am sorry ye hae brought so few
Into your company.
10
‘There’s fifteen thousand armed men
Encamped on yon lee;
Ye’ll never be a bite to them,
For aught that I can see.
11
‘But halve your men in equal parts,
Your purpose to fulfill;
Let ae half keep the
water-side,
The rest gae round the hill.
12
‘Your nether party fire must,
Then beat a flying drum;
And then they’ll think the day’s their ain,
And frae the trench they’ll come.
13
‘Then, those that are behind them maun
Gie shot, baith grit and sma;
And so, between your armies twa,
Ye may make them to fa.’
14
‘O were ye ever a soldier?’
Sir David Lesly said;
‘O yes; I was at Solway Flow,
Where we were all betrayd.
15
‘Again I was at curst Dunbar,
And was a prisner taen,
And many weary night and day
In prison I hae lien.’
16
‘If ye will lead these men aright,
Rewarded shall ye be;
But, if that ye a traitor prove,
I’ll hang thee on a tree.’
17
‘Sir, I will not a traitor prove;
Montrose has plunderd me;
I’ll do my best to banish him
Away frae this country.’
18
He halvd his men in equal parts,
His purpose to fulfill;
The one part kept the water-side,
The other gaed round the hill.
19
The nether party fired brisk,
Then turnd and seemd to rin;
And then they a’ came frae the trench,
And cry’d, The day’s our ain!
20
The rest then ran into the trench,
And loosd their cannons a’:
And thus, between his armies twa,
He made them fast to fa.
21
Now let us a’ for Lesly pray,
And his brave company,
For they hae vanquishd great Montrose,
Our cruel enemy.
44. Var. That we should take a dram: Scott. Probably a jocose suggestion.
203
THE BARON OF BRACKLEY
A. a. ‘The Baronne of Braikley,’ [Alexander Laing’s] Scarce Ancient Ballads, 1822, p. 9. b. ‘The Baron of Braikley,’ Buchan’s Gleanings, 1825, p. 68. c. ‘The Barrone of Brackley,’ The New Deeside Guide, by James Brown (pseudonym for Joseph Robertson), Aberdeen, [1832[[60]]], p. 46.
B. ‘The Baron of Brackley,’ Kinloch MSS, V, 379; in the handwriting of John Hill Burton.
C. a. ‘The Baron of Braikly,’ Jamieson-Brown MS., Appendix, p. viii. b. ‘The Baron of Brackley,’ Jamieson’s Popular Ballads, 1806, I, 102.
D. ‘The Baron of Breachell,’ Skene MS., p. 110.
First printed by Jamieson (C b) in 1806, who says: “For the copy of the ballad here given I am indebted to Mrs Brown. I have also collated it with another, less perfect, but not materially different, so far as it goes, with which I was favored by the editor of the Border Minstrelsy, who took it down from the recitation of two ladies, great-grandchildren of Farquharson of Inverey; so that the ballad, and the notices that accompany it, are given upon the authority of a Gordon [Anne Gordon, Mrs Brown] and a Farquharson.”[[61]] A c is also a compounded copy: see the notes.
The text in The Thistle of Scotland, p. 46, is C b. That which is cited in part in the Fourth Report on Historical Manuscripts, 1874, p. 534, is A c. The ballad is rewritten by Allan Cunningham, Songs of Scotland, II, 208.
A. Inverey comes before day to Brackley’s gate, and calls to him to open and have his blood spilled. Brackley asks over the wall whether the people below are gentlemen or hired gallows-birds; if gentlemen, they may come in and eat and drink; in the other case, they may go on to the Lowlands and steal cattle. His wife urges him to get up; the men are nothing but hired gallows-birds. Brackley will go out to meet Inverey (both know it is he, 12, 19), but these same gallows-birds will prove themselves men. His wife derisively calls on her maids to bring their distaffs; if Brackley is not man enough to protect his cattle, she will drive off the robbers with her women. Brackley says he will go out, but he shall never come in. He arms and sallies forth, attended by his brother William, his uncle, and his cousin; but presently bids his brother turn back because he is a bridegroom. William refuses, and in turn, but equally to no effect, urges Brackley to turn back for his wife’s and his son’s sake. The Gordons are but four against four hundred of Inverey’s, and are all killed. Brackley’s wife, so far from tearing her hair, braids it, welcomes Inverey, and makes him a feast. The son, on the nurse’s knee, vows to be revenged if he lives to be a man. (Cf. ‘Johnie Armstrong,’ III, 367, where this should have been noted.)
The other versions agree with A a in the material points. Inverey’s numbers are diminished. In B 10, C 11, Brackley has only his brother with him, meaning, perhaps, when he leaves his house. The fight was not simply at the gates, but was extended over a considerable distance (A 33, B 11), and other men joined the Gordons in the course of it. In B 12 we learn that the miller’s four sons (D 10, the miller and his three sons) were killed with the Gordons (and William Gordon’s wife, or bride, in A 25, is ‘bonnie Jean, the maid o the mill’). In B 15, D 12, Craigevar comes up with a party, and might have saved Brackley’s life had he been there an hour sooner. In A a, b, C, D, Brackley’s wife is Peggy (Peggy Dann, wrongly, D 14, 15); in B 19 (wrongly) Catharine Fraser. D makes Catharine the wife of Gordon of Glenmuick (Alexander Gordon, A a 35), who rives her hair, as Brackley’s wife does not (14, 15, 18, 19). In C, Peggy Gordon, besides feasting Inverey, keeps him till morning, and then shows him a road by which he may go safely home. C b adds, for poetical justice, that Inverey at once let this haggard down the wind.
This affray occurred in September, 1666. The account of it given by the Gordons (the son of the murdered laird and the Marquis of Huntly) was that John Gordon of Brackley, having poinded cattle belonging to John Farquharson of Inverey, or his followers, Inverey “convoked his people, to revenge himself on Brackley for putting the law in execution; that he came to the house of Brackley, and required the laird to restore his cattle which had been poinded; and that, although the laird gave a fair answer, yet the Farquharsons, with the view of drawing him out of his house, drove away not only the poinded cattle but also Brackley’s own cattle, and when the latter was thus forced to come out of his house, the Farquharsons fell on him and murdered him and his brother.”
A memorandum for John Farquharson of Inverey and others, 24 January, 1677, “sets forth that John Gordon of Brackley, having bought from the sheriff of Aberdeen the fines exigible from Inverey and others for killing of black-fish, the said Brackley made friendly arrangements with others, but declined to settle with Inverey; whereupon the latter, being on his way to the market at Tullich,[[62]] sent Mr John Ferguson, minister at Glenmuick, John McHardy of Crathie, a notary, and Duncan Erskine, portioner of Invergelder, to the laird of Brackley, with the view of representing to him that Inverey and his tenants were willing to settle their fines on the same terms as their neighbors. These proposals were received by Brackley with contempt, and during the time of the communing he gathered his friends and attacked Inverey, and having ‘loused severall shotts’ against Inverey’s party, the return shots of the latter were in self-defence. The result was that the laird of Brackley, with his brother William and their cousin James Gordon in Cults, were killed on the one side, and on the other Robert McWilliam in Inverey, John McKenzie, sometime there, and Malcom Gordon the elder.” The convocation of Inverey’s friends is accounted for in the same document by the fact that Inverey was captain of the watch for the time; that he and his ancestors had been used to go to the market with men to guard it; and that it is the custom of the country for people who are going to the market to join any numerous company that may be going the same way, either for their own security or out of “kindness for the persons with whom they go,” and also the custom of that mountainous country to go with arms, especially at markets. (Abstract, by Dr. John Stuart, of a MS. of Col. James Farquharson of Invercauld, Historical MSS Commission, Fourth Report, p. 534).
Another account, agreeing in all important points with the last, is given in a history of the family of Macintosh.[[63]] It will be borne in mind that Inverey belonged to this clan, and that acts of his would therefore be put in a favorable light. Brackley had seized the horses of some of Inverey’s people on account of fines alleged to be due by them for taking salmon in the Dee out of season. Inverey represented to Brackley that the sufferers by this proceeding were men who had incurred no penalty, and offered, if the horses should be restored, to deliver the guilty parties for punishment. Brackley would not return the horses on these terms, and Inverey then proposed that the matter in dispute should be left to friends. While Brackley was considering what to do, Alexander Gordon of Aberfeldy came to offer his services, with a body of armed men, and Brackley, now feeling himself strong, rejected the suggestion of a peaceful solution, and set out to attack Inverey. When a collision was impending, Inverey at first drew back, begging Brackley to desist from violence, which only made Brackley and Aberfeldy the keener. Two of Inverey’s followers were slain; and then Inverey and his men, in self-defence, turned on their assailants, and killed Gordon of Brackley, his brother William, and James Gordon of Cults.
The Gordons, this account further says, began a prosecution of Inverey and his party before the Court of Justiciary. Inverey had recourse to Macintosh, his chief, who exerted himself so effectually in behalf of his kinsman that when the case was called no plaintiff appeared. Nevertheless Dr John Stuart (Historical MSS, as above) produces a warrant “for apprehending John Farquharson of Inverey and others his followers, who had been outlawed for not compearing to answer at their trial, and had subsequently continued for many years in their outlawry, associating with themselves a company of thieves, murderers, and sorners; therefore empowering James Innes, Serjeant, and Corporal Radnoch, commanding a party of troops at Kincardine O’Neill, to apprehend the said John Farquharson and his accomplices.” From this warrant Dr Stuart considers that we may infer that Inverey was the aggressor in the affray with Brackley. But there is nothing to identify the case, and the date of the warrant is February 12, 1685, nearly twenty years from the affair which we are occupied with, during which space, unless he were of an unusually peaceable habit, Inverey might have had several broils on his hands.
Gordon of Brackley, as reported by Mrs Brown, from what she may have heard in her girlhood, a hundred years after his tragical end, was “a man universally esteemed.”[[64]] “Farquharson of Inverey,” says Jamieson, without giving his authority, “a renowned freebooter on Deeside, was his relation, and in habits of friendly intercourse with him. Farquharson was fierce, daring, and active, exhibiting all the worst characteristics of a freebooter, with nothing of that blunt and partially just and manly generosity which were then not uncommonly met with among that description of men. The common people supposed him (as they did Dundee, and others of the same cast who were remarkable for their fortunate intrepidity and miraculous escapes) to be a warlock, and proof against steel and lead. He is said to have been buried on the north side of a hill, which the sun could never shine upon, etc.” All which, as far as appears, is merely the tradition of Jamieson’s day, and will be taken at different values by different readers.
The ‘Peggy’ of A a, b, C, D was Margaret Burnet, daughter of Sir Thomas Burnet of Leys, and own cousin of Gilbert Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury.[[65]] This lady married Gordon of Brackley against her friends’ wishes, or without their consent, and so probably made a love-match. After Brackley’s death she married one James Leslie, Doctor of Medicine,[[66]] a fact which will suffice to offset the unconfirmed scandal of the ballad.
It is now to be noted that a baron of Brackley had been murdered by caterans towards the end of the preceding century. “The Clanchattan, who, of all that faction, most eagerly endeavored to revenge the Earl of Murray his death, assembling their forces under Angus Donald Williamson his conduct, entered Strathdee and Glenmuick, where they invaded the Earl of Huntly his lands, and killed four of the surname of Gordon, Henry Gordon of the Knock, Alexander Gordon of Teldow, Thomas Gordon of Blaircharrish, and the old baron of Breaghly, whose death and manner thereof was so much the more lamented because he was very aged, and much given to hospitality, and slain under trust. He was killed by them in his own house after he had made them good cheer, without suspecting or expecting any such reckoning for his kindly entertainment; which happened the first day of November, 1592. In revenge whereof the Earl of Huntly assembled some of his forces and made an expedition into Pettie,” etc. (See No 183, III, 456.) So writes Sir Robert Gordon, before 1630.[[67]]
Upon comparing Sir Robert Gordon’s description of the old baron of Brackley who was murdered in 1592 with what is said of the baron in the ballad (A), there is a likeness for which there is no historical authority in the instance of the baron of 1666. The ballad intimates the hospitality which is emphasized by Sir Robert Gordon, and also the baron’s unconsciousness of his having any foe to dread. (“An honest aged man,” says Spotiswood, “against whom they could pretend no quarrel.”) Other details are not pertinent to the elder baron, but belong demonstrably to the Brackley who had a quarrel with Farquharson.
Of the two, the older Brackley would have a better chance of being celebrated in a ballad. He was an aged and innocent man, slain while dispensing habitual hospitality, “slain under trust.” The younger Brackley treated Inverey’s people harshly, there was an encounter, Brackley was killed, and others on both sides. His friends may have mourned for him, but there was no call for the feeling expressed in the ballad; that would be more naturally excited by the death of the kindly old man, ‘who basely was slain.’ On the whole it may be surmised that two occurrences, or even two ballads, have been blended, and some slight items of corroborative evidence may favor this conclusion.
‘The Gordons may mourn him and bann Inverey,’ says B 14. It appears that the Earl of Aboyne sided with Inverey, though the Marquis of Huntly supported the laird of Brackley’s son;[[68]] whereas all the Gordons would have mourned the older baron, and none would have maintained the caterans who slew him.
In the affray with the Farquharsons in 1666 there were killed, of the Gordons, besides Brackley, his brother William and his cousin James Gordon of Cults. The Gordons killed by the Clanchattan in 1592 were Brackley, Henry Gordon of the Knock, an Alexander Gordon (also a Thomas). According to A 34, 35, the Gordons killed were Brackley and his brother William, his cousin James of the Knox [Knocks, Knock], and his uncle Alexander Gordon; according to B 12, 13, there were killed, besides Brackley, “Harry Gordon and Harry of the Knock” (one and the same person), Brackley’s brother, as we see from 10; in D 10, the killed are Brackley, and Sandy Gordon o the Knock, called Peter in 21. A Gordon of the Knock is named as killed in A, B, D, and it is Henry Gordon in B; an Alexander Gordon is named in A, B. A William Gordon and a James (of the Knocks, not of the Cults) are named in A. On the whole, the names sort much better with the earlier story.
In B 15 we are told that if Craigievar had come up an hour sooner, Brackley had not been slain. Upon this Dr Joseph Robertson (who assigned the ballad to 1592) has observed, Kinloch MSS, VI, 24, that Craigievar passed to a branch of the family of Forbes in 1625; so that Craigievar would have done nothing to save Brackley in 1666, the Gordons and the Forbeses having long been at feud. To make sense of this stanza we must suppose an earlier date than 1625.
The fourth edition of Spotiswood’s history, printed in 1677 (about forty years after the author’s death), calls Brackley of 1592 John Gordon. Further, there is this anonymous marginal note, not found in the preceding editions: “I have read in a MS. called the Acts of the Gordons, that Glenmuick, Glentaner, Strathdee and Birs were spoiled, and Brachlie, with his son-in-law, slain, by Mackondoquy [that is Maconochie, alias Campbell] of Inner-Aw.”[[69]]
Brackley, on the Muick, is in close vicinity to the village of Ballater, on the Dee, some forty miles westward from Aberdeen.
Translated by Knortz, Lieder u. Romanzen Alt-Englands, p. 156, after Allingham.