“The harp, the lute, the fife, the flute, and the cymbal.
Sweet goes the treble violin,
The flowers that blow in the valley.”
How is it possible that a ballad sung in two forms in Scotland, and recovered there in a fragmentary condition, should be known in very similar forms in Cornwall? To suppose that the two versions were carried from the Highlands to the Land’s End, so as to have become popular, is inconceivable. It is more likely that the same English ballad found its way both north and south-west, and when it had been displaced elsewhere, remained in the extremities of the island. The burden in each case is clearly that which marked the melody. We very much wish that the Scottish airs, to which these ballads were sung, had been preserved, that they might be compared with those to which they were sung in Cornwall. The burden in each case has nothing to do with the story, but it seems to indicate that the same ballad in its two forms, to two independent airs, was carried all over Great Britain at some period unknown. The same ballad was also sung in Cheshire at the close of last century, and also in Ireland.
Another specimen given by Mr. Gilbert is that of the “Three Sisters.”
“There were three sisters fair and bright,
Jennifer, Gentle and Rosemaree;
And they three loved one valiant knight;
As the doo (dove) flies over the mulberry tree.”[36]
The same is found in broadside, in the Pepysian and other collections, and as “The Unco Knicht’s Wooing” in Scotland.