"You are no love for me, Margaret,
I am no love for you."
And the following stanza,
"When it was grown to dark midnight,
And all were fast asleep,
In came Margarets grimly ghost
And stood at Williams feet."
These lines have acquired an importance by giving birth to one of the most beautiful ballads in our own or any language. See the song intitled Margaret's Ghost, at the end of this volume.
Since the first edition some improvements have been inserted, which were communicated by a lady of the first distinction, as she had heard this song repeated in her infancy.
[The ballads on the two lovers Margaret and William are numerous, culminating as they do in Mallet's William and Margaret. See Sweet William's Ghost (No. 6 in this book) and Mallet's ballad (No. 16 of book iii). The present ballad is also in the Douce Collection and in that of the late Mr. George Daniel. Jamieson prints (Popular Ballads and Songs, 1806, vol. i. p. 22) a ballad entitled Sweet Willie and Fair Annie, which may be divided into two parts, the first resembling Lord Thomas and Fair Elinor, and the second, Fair Annie's Ghost, is still more like the following ballad.
Mr. Chappell remarks, "Another point deserving notice in the old ballad is that one part of it has furnished the principal subject of the modern burlesque ballad Lord Lovel, and another that of T. Hood's song, Mary's Ghost.">[
