[82]. Russell, as above, p. 464; Wodrow, II, 86.
[83]. But see “Clavers, the Despot’s Champion,” p. 72 ff.
[84]. In Notes and Queries, First Series, V, 249.
[85]. The Works of the late L. Delamer, 1694, The Case of William, Earl of Devonshire, p. 563; which is the plea referred to further on.
[86]. Such poetical propriety as ‘The second, more alarming still,’ 32; ‘The words that passd, alas! presaged’ 183. But really the text was not very much altered. Some verses, here dropped, were added “to give a finish.”
[87]. See W. S. Gibson, Dilston Hall, etc., 1850, p. 54.
[88]. Buchanan, Rer. Scot. Hist., fol. 186; Lesley, History of Scotland, p. 251 f.
[89]. In J, which cannot be relied on for smaller points, we read that Charles Hay has been hanged, for reasons not given: st. 20.
[90]. This intimation is repeated in G 10, with the ludicrous variation of bloody ‘breeks.’ In B, an English lord, whose competency and interest in the matter are alike difficult to comprehend, declares that he will have Geordie hanged, will have Geordie’s head, before the morrow. A Scottish lord rejoins that he will cast off his coat and fight, will fight in blood up to the knees; and the king adds, there will be bloody heads among us all, before that happens. Who the parties to the fight are to be, unless it is the English lord against Scotland, is not evident. B is inflated with superfluous verses.
[91]. It seems to have been familiar in Aberdeen as early as 1627. Joseph Haslewood made an entry in his copy of Ritson’s Scotish Song of a manuscript Lute-Book (presented in 1781 to Dr Charles Burney by Dr Skene of Marischal College) which contained airs noted and collected by Robert Gordon, “at Aberdein, in the yeare of our Lord 1627.” Among some ninety titles of tunes mentioned, there occur ‘Ther wer three ravns’ and ‘God be with the, Geordie.’ (W. Macmath.)