In the Danish 'Young William,' A, Svend of Voldesløv, rich in gold, woos Lisbet, who prefers William for his good qualities. Svend shuts himself up in his room, sick with grief. His mother and sister come and go. The mother will get him a fairer maid, and gives him the good rede not to distress himself about a girl that is plighted to another man. The sister gives a bad rede, to kill William, and so get the bride. The mother remarks that a son is coming into being who would revenge his father's death. The business can be done, says Svend, before that son is born, and immediately after takes occasion to meet William as he is passing through a wood, and kills him. Forty weeks gone, Lisbet gives birth to a son, but Svend is told that she has borne a daughter. Young William attains to the age of eighteen, and is a stalwart youth, given to games of strength. One day when he is putting the stone with a peasant, the two fall out, and the peasant, being roughly treated, calls out, You had better avenge your father's death. Young William hastens to his mother, and asks whether his father's death had been by violence, and, if so, who killed him. The mother thinks him too young to wield a sword: he must summon Svend to a court. This is done. Svend informs his uncle that he is summoned to court by William, and asks what he is to do. The uncle had always been told that Lisbet's child was a girl. I shall never live to see the day, says Svend, when I shall beat a woman at tricks. Svend goes to the court, attended by many of his uncle's men. William charges him with the murder of his father, for which no compensation has been offered. Svend says not a penny will be paid, and William draws his sword and cuts him down. For killing Svend William is summoned to court by Svend's brother, Nilus. Nilus demands amends. William says they are quit, with brother against father, and he will marry Nilus's sister (whom he has already carried off). Never, says Nilus, for which William finds it necessary to kill him. He then rides to his mother, who asks what amends have been offered for his father's death, and, on hearing that William has killed both the murderer and his brother, clasps him to her heart, for all her grief is now over.
No other Scandinavian copy besides Danish A has the killing of Nilus, which may be regarded as an aftergrowth. In the Icelandic version, the sister, so far from putting her brother up to the murder, bursts into tears when her brother tells what he has done, because she knows that revenge will follow. The murderer offers himself to his former love in place of her husband, at the very moment when she is bowed in anguish over the dead body. She replies significantly, He is not far from me that shall revenge him. All the Scandinavian copies have the three chief points of the story except the Swedish, which lacks the first half.
Another Scandinavian ballad has many of the features of 'Young William:' Danish, 'Liden Engel,' A, Danske Viser, No 127, III, 147; B, Levninger, II, 82, No 13; C, Kristensen, I, 254, No 97, a fragment. Norwegian, 'Unge Ingelbrett,' Bugge, p. 110, No 23, derived from the Danish. According to Danish A, and for the most part B, Liden Engel (who, by the way, is of Westerris) carries off a bride by force. Her brother burns him and all his people in a church in which they have taken refuge, the lady being saved by lifting her on shields up to a window, whence she is taken by her natural friends. It is the mother that suggests the setting of the church on fire, and the first act of the daughter, after getting out of the church with singed hair, is to fall on her bare knees and pray that she may have a son who will take vengeance on her brother. A son is born, and called after his father, but his existence is as far as possible kept secret. As he grows up his mother is always saying to him, Thine uncle was the death of thy father. The boy wishes to serve the king; the mother says, Go, but remember thy father's death. The king observes that the youth has always a weight on his mind, and on his asking the cause Little Engel answers that his uncle had slain his father and paid no boot. The king says, If you wish to revenge his death, as it is quite proper you should, I will lend you three hundred men. When the uncle is informed that Little Engel is coming against him he declares that he had never heard of such a person before: so the secret has been well kept. Little Engel burns his uncle and all his people in a stone chamber in which they had shut themselves up.
In the Norwegian-Danish ballad Engel, or Ingelbrett, the second simply kills his uncle with a sword. The offence given in this case is not the carrying off a bride by force, but the omitting to ask the brother's consent to the marriage, though that of all the rest of the family had been obtained: another instance of the danger of such neglect in addition to those already mentioned in the preface to 'The Cruel Brother,' I, 142.
'Fause Foodrage' has some affinity with '[Jellon Grame].'
Scott's copy is translated by Schubart, p. 102; Wolff, Halle der Völker, I, 33, and Hausschatz, p. 211; Doenniges, p. 51; Knortz, Schottische Balladen, No 28.
'Ung Villum' is translated by Prior, III, 422, No 170; 'Liden Engel' by the same, III, 379, No 164.
A
Alexander Fraser Tytler's Brown MS., No 3.