She's taen him in her arms twa,
And gien him kisses thorough,50
And wi' her tears she bath'd his wounds,
Upo' the braes o' Yarrow.
Her father looking ower his castle wa',
Beheld his daughter's sorrow;
"O had your tongue, daughter," he says,55
"And let be a' your sorrow,
I'll wed you wi' a better lord,
Than he that died on Yarrow."
"O had your tongue, father," she says,
"And let be till to-morrow;60
A better lord there cou'dna be
Than he that died on Yarrow."
She kiss'd his lips, and comb'd his hair,
As she had dune before, O;
Then wi' a crack her heart did brack,65
Upon the braes o' Yarrow.
[39]. To dream of any thing green is regarded in Scotland as unlucky.
SIR JAMES THE ROSE.
Pinkerton first published this piece in his Scottish Tragic Ballads, p. 61. In a note, it is said to have been taken "from a modern edition in one sheet, 12mo. after the old copy." Motherwell gives another version "as it occurs in early stall prints," (Minstrelsy, p. 321,) and suspects a few conjectural emendations in Pinkerton's text. The passage from v. 51 to v. 59 is apparently defective, and has, probably, been tampered with; but Pinkerton's copy is on the whole much better than Motherwell's, or than Whitelaw's, (Scottish Ballads, 39,) which professes to be given chiefly from oral recitations.