LADY ISABEL AND THE ELF-KNIGHT.
From Buchan's Ballads of the North of Scotland, i. 22, where it
is entitled The Gowans sae gay, from the burden.
The hero of the first of the two following ballads would seem to be an Elf, that of the second a Nix, or Merman, though the punishment awarded to each of them in the catastrophe, as the ballads now exist, is not consistent with their supernatural character. It is possible that in both instances two independent stories have been blended: but it is curious that the same intermixture should occur in Norse and German also. See Grundtvig's preface to Noekkens Svig, ii. p. 57. The conclusion in all these cases is derived from a ballad resembling May Colvin, vol. ii. p. 272.
We have had the Elf-Knight introduced under the same circumstances at page 128; indeed, the first three or four stanzas are common to both pieces.
Fair lady Isabel sits in her bower sewing,
Aye as the gowans grow gay;
There she heard an elf-knight blawing his horn,
The first morning in May.
5 "If I had yon horn that I hear blawing,"
Aye as the gowans grow gay;
"And yon elf-knight to sleep in my bosom,"
The first morning in May.
This maiden had scarcely these words spoken,
10 Aye as the gowans grow gay;
Till in at her window the elf-knight has luppen,
The first morning in May.
"Its a very strange matter, fair maiden," said he,
Aye as the gowans grow gay,
15 "I canna' blaw my horn, but ye call on me,"
The first morning in May.
"But will ye go to yon greenwood side,"
Aye as the gowans grow gay?
"If ye canna' gang, I will cause you to ride,"
20 The first morning in May.