Shakspeare and His Times [Vol. 2 of 2] / Including the Biography of the Poet; criticisms on his genius and writings; a new chronology of his plays; a disquisition on the on the object of his sonnets; and a history of the manners, customs, and amusements, superstitions, poetry, and elegant literature of his age

by Nathan Drake

"Bot sen my spreit mon from my bodye go,

I recommend it to the Quene of Fary,

Eternally into her court to tarry

In wilderness amang the holtis hair;"[319:B]

and the latter, in his Flyting against Polwart, speaking of Hallow'een, tells us, that

"The king of Pharie and his court, with the elf queen,

With many elfish incubus was ridand that night."[319:C]

According to the Tale of the Young Tamlane, a poem in its original state coeval with the Complaynt of Scotland, and on the authority of the Ballad of Thomas the Rhymer, said also to be of considerable antiquity[319:D], Elf-land is represented as a terrestrial paradise, the opening of the road to which was in the desert

"Where living land was left behind;"

it is described as a "bonny road" "that winds about the fernie brae,"