[35]. Douglas insinuates that Percy was rescued by his soldiers.—S.
[140]. Douglas was really buried in Melrose Abbey, where his tomb is still to be seen.
THE HUNTING OF THE CHEVIOT.
In the Battle of Otterbourne the story is told with all the usual accuracy of tradition, and the usual fairness of partizans. Not so with the following ballad, which is founded on the same event. "That which is commonly sung of the Hunting of Cheviot," says Hume of Godscroft truly, "seemeth indeed poetical, and a
mere fiction, perhaps to stir up virtue; yet a fiction whereof there is no mention either in the Scottish or English chronicle." When this ballad arose we do not know, but we may suppose that a considerable time would elapse before a minstrel would venture to treat an historical event with so much freedom.
We must, however, allow some force to these remarks of Percy: "With regard to the subject of this ballad, although it has no countenance from history, there is room to think it had originally some foundation in fact. It was one of the laws of the Marches, frequently renewed between the nations, that neither party should hunt in the other's borders, without leave from the proprietors or their deputies. There had long been a rivalship between the two martial families of Percy and Douglas, which, heightened by the national quarrel, must have produced frequent challenges and struggles for superiority, petty invasions of their respective domains, and sharp contests for the point of honour; which would not always be recorded in history. Something of this kind, we may suppose, gave rise to the ancient ballad of the Hunting a' the Cheviat. Percy Earl of Northumberland had vowed to hunt for three days in the Scottish border, without condescending to ask leave from Earl Douglas, who was either lord of the soil, or lord warden of the Marches. Douglas would not fail to resent the insult, and endeavour to repel the intruders by force: this would naturally produce a sharp conflict between the two parties; something of which, it is probable, did really happen, though not attended with the tragical circumstances recorded in the ballad: for these are evidently borrowed from the Battle of Otter
bourn, a very different event, but which aftertimes would easily confound with it."[1]
The ballad as here printed is of the same age as the preceding. It is extracted from Hearne's Preface to the History of Guilielmus Neubrigensis, p. lxxxii. Hearne derived his copy from a manuscript in the Ashmolean collection at Oxford, and printed the text in long lines, which, according to custom, are now broken up into two.
The manuscript copy is subscribed at the end "Expliceth quoth Rychard Sheale." Richard Sheale (it has been shown by a writer in the British Bibliographer, vol. iv. p. 97-105) was a minstrel by profession, and several other pieces in the same MS. have a like signature with this. On this ground it has been very strangely concluded that Sheale was not, as Percy and Ritson supposed, the transcriber, but the actual author of this noble ballad. The glaring objection of the antiquity of the language has