'Twas up and spake the gude Lady Hume,
As she sat by the judge's knee:
"A peck of white pennies, my gude lord judge,
If you'll grant Hughie the Græme to me."
"O no, O no, my gude Lady Hume!
Forsooth and so it mustna be;
Were he but the one Græme of the name,
He suld be hanged high for me."
"If I be guilty," said Hughie the Græme,
"Of me my friends shall have small talk:"
And he has leaped fifteen feet and three,
Tho' his hands they were tied behind his back.
He looked over his left shoulder,
And for to see what he might see;
There was he aware of his ould father,
Came tearing his hair most piteously.
"O hauld your tongue, my father," he says,
"And see that ye dinna weep for me!
For they may ravish me o' my life,
But they canna banish me fro' heaven hie.
"Fare ye weel, fair Maggie, my wife!
The last time we came ower the muir,
'Twas thou bereft me of my life,
And wi' the bishop thou play'd the whore.
"Here, Johnnie Armstrong, take thou my sword,
That is made o' the metal sae fine;
And when thou comest to the English side,
Remember the death of Hughie the Græme."
There are two or more versions of the foregoing: one in Ritson's Collection; and one communicated by Burns to Johnson's Museum. The ballad of Hobbie Noble relates to a hero of the same stamp, who suffered about the same period, at the same place, for a similar love for English oxen and sheep. Hobbie was an Englishman; who, finding less difference in the laws of "mine and thine" on the Scotch side of the border, and more sympathy with such loose notions of property as he possessed, established himself among the Scotch, and helped them to ravage the country to Carlisle southward, whenever opportunity offered. The Scotch, however, proved false to him. The Armstrongs, amongst whom he was residing, were bribed by the English to decoy him over the border upon pretence of a raid or foray; where he was delivered up to a party from Carlisle castle, that had long been on the look-out for him. By these he was taken to Carlisle, and hanged on Hairibee in less than twenty-four hours afterwards.
HOBBIE NOBLE.
Foul fa' the breast first treason bred in!
That Liddesdale may safely say:
For in it there was baith meat and drink,
And corn unto our geldings gay.