I wanted not my fee,
But I wanted some bounties
that ladies can gie.’
95. The Maid freed from the Gallows.
P. 346, III, 516 a, IV, 481 b. Italian. Maria Carmi, Canti pop. Emiliani, Archivio, XII, 189. Brunetina, after she has been rescued by her lover, is informed, while she is dancing at a ball, that her mother is dead. Bury her, she replies, I will dress in complete red, and she goes on dancing. So of her father. But when told that her lover is dead, she says she will dress in complete black, and bids the music stop, for she wishes to dance no more. ‘La Ballerina,’ Nigra, No 107, p. 469, is no doubt the last half of this ballad corrupted at the conclusion. The woman will not stop dancing for the reported death of father, mother, brother, sister, husband, but when told that her boy is dead asks the players to cease, her legs are broken, she can dance no more.
In ‘Leggenda Marinesca’ (di Catanzaro), La Calabria, October, 1893, VI, 16, a wife (or perhaps an affianced young woman) is ransomed from pirates by her husband (or betrothed), after father, mother, and brother have refused. If her father, mother, brother, should die, she would deck her hair, dress in red, yellow, or white, bid the guitar strike up, and dance; but if her true-love died, she would put on black, cut her hair, and throw the guitar into the sea.
349. Mr Kaarle Krohn, of the University of Helsingfors, has favored me with the following study of the very numerous Finnish and Esthonian versions of this ballad, incorporating therein the researches of his father, Julius Krohn, already referred to at IV, 482 a. (Estlander’s discussion, which I had not seen, “Sången om den friköpta,” occupies pp. 331-356 of the tenth volume of Finsk Tidskrift.)
I. The West Finnish versions, dispersed over West and East Finland and Ingria. These are in the modern metre, which came into use hardly before the end of the seventeenth century, and it is in the highest degree probable that they were learned from the Swedes. About thirty copies known. Specimen, Reinholm’s collection, H 12, No 76, from the Nystad district northward from Åbo, in Southwest Finland; J. K., p. 11[120].
Prevailing traits: 1. The maid is sitting in a little room, less frequently in a ship’s cabin or a boat. 2. The father has three horses. 3. The mother has three cows. 4. The brother has three swords. 5. The sister has three crowns, or, in copies from further east, where crowns are not used for head-gear, three silk kerchiefs. 6. The lover has three ships, or almost as often three castles (mansions). There are variations, but rarely, as to the objects possessed, and sometimes exchanges, but only two cases are of importance. In one copy from the extreme of Southeast Finland, the father has three oxen, which seems to be the original disposition, the change to horses coming about from the circumstance that oxen are seldom employed for ploughing in Finland. In four copies from the most eastern part of Finland the sister has three sheep, perhaps owing to the influence of the East Finnish versions. 7. The imprecations and benedictions at the end occur regularly. May the horses be knocked up or die at ploughing-time; may the cows die, dry up, etc., at milking-time; the swords shiver in war-time; the crowns fall off or melt at wedding or dance (the silk kerchiefs tear, fade, spoil with wet); and on the other hand, may the ships sail well, do well, make money at trading-time; the castles rise, flourish in time of destitution, of bad crops. Etc.
II. The later Esthonian versions, Esthonia and Livonia, in modern metre, of more recent origin, probably, than in Finland. About twenty copies known. Specimen, J. Hurt, Vana Kannel, II, 365, No 367. Lilla is sitting in the little room in weary expectation. She sees her father walking on the sea-beach. ‘Dear father, beloved father, ransom me!’ ‘Wherewith ransom you, when I have no money?’ ‘You have three horses at home, and can pawn one.’ ‘I can do better without my Lilla than without my three horses; the horses are mine for all my life, Lilla for a short time.’ In like fashion, the mother is not willing to sacrifice one of her three cows, the brother one of his three swords, the sister one of her three rings. But the lover, who has three ships, says, I can better give up a ship than give up my dear Lilla; my ships are mine for a short time, but Lilla for all my life. Lilla breaks out in execrations: may her father’s horses fall dead when they are ploughing in summer, may her mother’s cows dry up in milking, her brother’s swords shiver in war, her sister’s rings break in the very act of marrying; but may her true-love’s ships long bring home precious wares.