[69] The following note is inserted in the fourth edition of the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, published in July 1795 (vol. i. p. xcvii.):
“Of the 24 songs in what is now called ‘Robin Hood’s Garland,’ many are so modern as not to be found in Pepys’s collection, completed only in 1700. In the [editor’s] folio MS. are ancient fragments of the following, viz.—Robin Hood and the beggar.—Robin Hood and the butcher.—Robin Hood and fryer Tucke.—Robin Hood and the pindar.—Robin Hood and queen Catharine, in two parts.—Little John and the four beggars, and “Robine Hood his death.” This last, which is very curious, has no resemblance to any that have yet been published; [it is probably num. xxviii. of part ii.], and the others are extremely different from the printed copies; but they unfortunately are in the beginning of the MS. where half of every leaf hath been torn away.”
As this MS. “contains several songs relating to the civil war in the last century,” the mere circumstance of its comprising fragments of the above ballads is no proof of a higher antiquity; any more than its not containing “one that alludes to the Restoration” proves its having been compiled before that period; or than, because some of these 24 songs are not to be found in Pepys’s collection, they are more modern than 1700. If the MS. could be collated, it would probably turn out that many of its contents have been inaccurately and unfaithfully transcribed, by some illiterate persons, from printed copies still extant, and, consequently, that it is, so far, of no authority. See the advertisement prefixed.
[70] Mr. Warton has mistaken and misprinted this line so as to make it absolute nonsense.
“Is not my reason good?
Good—even good—Robin Hood.”
(His. En. po. vol. ii.)
[71] Drayton’s Polyolbion, song 26, p. 122 (supra, p. vii.)
[72] In Churchyard’s “Replication onto Camel’s Objections” he tells the latter:
“Your knowledge is great, your judgement is good,