4
'Would thy leman now but come,
Thou wouldst give him to drink out of thy hand.'
5
By all the worlds Magdalen swore,
That leman she never had.
Swedish G:
4
'Yes, but if I thy leman were,
I should get drink from thy snow-white hand.'
5
Maria swore by the Holy Ghost,
She neer had to do with any man.
The woman is said to have taken the lives of her three children in Danish A, B, C, and of two in Swedish C, D, F, I, J, K (B also, where there are but two in all), a trait probably borrowed from '[The Cruel Mother].'
The seven years' penance of the Scandinavian ballads is multiplied three times in English A, and four times in B and in those versions of 'The Cruel Mother' which have been affected by the present ballad (20, I, J, K; L is defective). What is more important, the penance in the English ballads is completely different in kind, consisting not in exaggerated austerities, but partly, at least, in transmigration or metensomatosis: seven years to be a fish, 20, I, J, K; seven years a bird, 20, I, J, K; seven years a stone, 21, A, B; seven years an eel, 20, J; seven years a bell, or bell-clapper, 20, I, 21, A (to ring a bell, 20, K, L). Seven years in hell seems to have been part of the penance or penalty in every case: seven years a porter in hell, 21, B, 20, I, K; seven years down in hell, 20, J; seven years to "ring the bell and see sic sights as ye darna tell, 20, L;" "other seven to lead an ape in hell," A, a burlesque variation of the portership.
The Finnish Mataleena, going to the well for water, sees the reflection of her face, and bewails her lost charms. Jesus begs a drink: she says she has no can, no glass. He bids her confess. "Where are your three boys? One you threw into the fire, one into the water, and one you buried in the wilderness." She fills a pail with her tears, washes his feet, and wipes them with her hair: then asks for penance. "Put me, Lord Jesus, where you will. Make me a ladder-bridge over the sea, a brand in the fire, a coal in the furnace."
There are several Slavic ballads which blend the story of the Samaritan woman and that of 'The Cruel Mother,' without admixture of the Magdalen. Wendish A, 'Aria' (M-aria?), Haupt and Schmaler, I, 287, No 290, has a maid Who goes for water on Sunday morning, and is joined by an old man who asks for a drink. She says the water is not clean; it is dusty and covered with leaves. He says, The water is clean, but you are unclean. She demands proof, and he bids her go to church in her maiden wreath. This she does. The grass withers before her, a track of blood follows her, and in the churchyard there come to her nine headless boys, who say, Nine sons hast thou killed, chopt off their heads, and meanest to do the same for a tenth. She entreats their forgiveness, enters the church, sprinkles herself with holy water, kneels at the altar and crosses herself, then suddenly sinks into the ground, so that nothing is to be seen but her yellow hair. B, 'Die Kindesmörderin,' ib., II, 149, No 197, begins like A. As the maid proceeds to the church, nine graves open before her, and nine souls follow her into the church. The oldest of her children springs upon her and breaks her neck, saying, "Mother, here is thy reward. Nine of us didst thou kill."
There are two Moravian ballads of the same tenor: A, Deutsches Museum, 1855, I, 282, translated by M. Klapp: B, communicated to the Zeitschrift des böhmischen Museums, 1842, p. 401, by A.W. Šembera, as sung by the "mährisch sprechenden Slawen" in Prussian Silesia; the first seven stanzas translated in Haupt u. Schmaler, II, 314, note to No 197. The Lord God goes out one Sunday morning, and meets a maid, whom he asks for water. She says the water is not clean. He replies that it is cleaner than she; for (A) she has seduced fifteen men and had children with all of them, has filled hell with the men and the sea with the children. He sends her to church; but, as she enters the church-yard, the bells begin to ring (of themselves), and when she enters the church, all the images turn their backs. As she falls on her knees, she is changed into a pillar of salt.