"Fly, Our Lady's keybearer! fly east, fly west, fly where thy lover dwells."
Of the rhymes of this class, one introduces the term Golloway. This may be intended for Yellow Way, the course of the sun in daytime, as distinct from the Milky Way, the course of the stars at night.
Another rhyme begins with the call Bishop, bishop, which has puzzled various commentators. I venture to suggest that the word be read Beeship, and that it indicates the boat that sailed across heaven bearing the souls of the dead, who were figured as bees. For the spirits of those who passed away, viewed under one aspect, were bees, and the ship that conveyed the dead in Norsk saga was actually designated as the Býskip. Mannhardt, in illustration, cites a line which the skald Egil Skallagrimssonr, whose date is between 902 and 980, sang on his son that had been drowned:—
Byrr es býskips i boe kominn kvanar son.
"In the beeship there has gone the son of my wife."
Our commentators inaccurately translate the expression as "City of the Hive" (C. P., I, 546).
According to a fancy of the Welsh bards, Britain was peopled with bees before the arrival of man, and this was held to account for its name, the "Isle of Honey."
A Prussian ladybird rhyme also mentions the boat that sailed across heaven. In Dantzig they sing:—
Herrgotspferdchen, fliege weg,
Dein Häuschen brennt, dein Kähnchen schwimmt,
Deine Kinder schreien nach Butterbrod;
Herrgotspferdchen, fliege weg.
(M., 349.)
"God Almighty's little horse, fly away, thy house is on fire, thy boat is afloat, thy children cry for bread and butter."