"Dr Blacklock informed Burns that this song... was composed on the horrid massacre at Glencoe": Stenhouse's note, IV, 92.
The English broadside, which may reasonably be believed to be formed upon a predecessor in the popular style, has been held to have a common origin with the Scandinavian ballad 'Maid and Stable Boy,' already spoken of under '[Child Waters]' at p. 84f of this volume. The points of resemblance are that a maid cuts her hair, dons man's clothes, and seeks service with a king. In the end she is married to the king's son, or to a nobleman of his court. The differences, in other respects, are considerable.
Percy's ballad is translated by Bodmer, I, 160; by Merk, Ursinus, p. 79, and Bothe, p. 307; by Döring, p. 329.
1 You beautious ladies, great and small,
I write unto you one and all,
Whereby that you may understand
What I have suffered in this land.
2 I was by birth a lady fair,
My father's chief and onely heir,
But when my good old father dy'd,
Then was I made a young knight's bride.
3 And then my love built me a bower,
Bedeckt with many a fragrant flower;
A braver bower you never did see
Then my true-love did build for me.
4 But there came thieves late in the night,
They rob'd my bower, and slew my knight,
And after that my knight was slain,
I could no longer there remain.
5 My servants all from me did flye,
In the midst of my extremity,
And left me by my self alone,
With a heart more cold then any stone.
6 Yet, though my heart was full of care,
Heaven would not suffer me to despair;
Wherefore in hast I chang'd my name
From Fair Elise to Sweet William.