In the following fine ballad the German influence is manifest. It is extant in two different texts. We give it in Bowring's version, which has less of amplification and embellishment than is usual in English translations.
THE DEAD LOVE.
I sought the dark wood where the oat grass was growing;
The maidens were there and that oat grass were mowing.
And I called to those maidens: "Now say if there be
The maiden I love 'midst the maidens I see?"
And they sighed as they answered: "Ah no! alas no!
She was laid in the bed of the tomb long ago."