This is the flow'ry wreath he wove, A blithsome knight came riding by, And heard her piteons moan; 1 1 Oh leave,' he cried, 'this grief so cold, Thou shalt have halls and castles fair: Oh hold thy peace, thou cruel knight, With thee my troth I will not plight, But I will die with my own true-love- Stay till I've deck'd my bridal bed, Thy halls and castles I despise, I want not gold, nor costly gear, Oh! be my bride, thou weeping fair, And I will build a tomb most rare, My love needs not a tomb so rare, Now go. sir knight, now go thy ways- And strew the flower, and pluck the thorn, So may some hand thy turf adorn Stay till I have deck'd my bridal bed, This dirge is certainly not ancient; but it is no treason to say it is better than if it were. We cannot suppress a suspicion that these legendary pieces flowed from the pen of a poet to whom neither his own nor this generation has been altogether just. We mean William Julius Mickle, the translator of the Lusiad. His Sir Martyn, written in imitation of Spenser's manner, with much of the copious and luxuriant description of his original, shows his attachment to the study of the ancient poetry of Britain; and his two beautiful ballads, entitled Hengist and Mey, and the Sorceress, have the same harmony of versification, the same simple and affecting turn of expression, with the Mr Mickle should have been a friend of the elder Mr Evans, as we believe, we consider that circumstance, joined to internal evidence, as sufficient to ascertain his property in the ballads in question. We have also to complain, that in publishing some other imitations of the ancient ballads, the authors' names have been withheld where, perhaps, they were more easily attainable than in the case just stated. Thus the ingenious Mr Henry Mackenzie (author of the Man of Feeling is well known to have written the beautiful Scottish ballad entitled Kenneth; and Michael Bruce that of Sir John Ross. The ballad of the Laidley Worm of Spindleston Heughs is also known to have been, in a very great measure, the production of the Rev. Mr Lambe, late vicar of Norham, and editor of the Battle of Floddenfield. It is founded upon a prevailing tradition in Bamboroughshire, and the author has interwoven a few stanzas of the original song concerning it, which begins, "Bambro' castle's built full high, It's built of marble stone, In revising his father's publication, Mr R. Evans has, with great judgment, discarded a number of sing-song imitations of the ancient ballad by Jerningham, Robinson, and other flimsy pretenders, who, seduced by the apparent ease of the task, ventured to lay their hand upon the minstrel lyre. For a different reason, he has omitted the contributions which his father levied upon Goldsmith, Gray, and other eminent moderns, whose works are in every one's hand. By this exclusion he has made room for a selection of genuine ancient poetry, compiled, by his own industry, from the hoarded treasures of black-letter ballads. It is no disgrace to Mr Evans, that these veterans, whom he has introduced to recruit his diminished ranks, are, generally speaking, more respectable for their antiquity than for any thing else. Percy, Ellis, and other editors of taste and geniùs, had long ago anticipated Mr Evans's labours, and left him but the refuse of the market. Some of the ballads, indeed, exhibit such wretched doggrel as serves, more than the dissertations of a thousand Ritsons, to degrade the character of our ancient song-enditers. The "Warning to Youth," for example, "shewing the lewd life of a merchant's sonne of London, and the misery that at the last he sustained by his notoriousnesse," might, notwithstanding the valuable moral attached to it, have been left, without injury to the public, to "dust and mere oblivion." Had we known Mr Evans's curiosity in such matters, we could have supplied him with as much stale poetry of a similar description as would have made his four volumes twenty. "It was a maid of low degree She strew'd the flow'rs, she pluck'd the weed, 'I've set thee. flow'r, for that the flow'r Of manhood lieth here; And water'd thee with plenteous show'r Of many a briny tear.' Sweet turf, thy green more green appears, This is the flow'ry wreath he wove, A blithsome knight came riding by, And heard her piteons moan; 'Oh leave,' he cried, 'this grief so cold, Thou shalt have halls and castles fair: 'Oh hold thy peace, thou cruel knight, But I will die with my own true-love- Thy halls and castles I despise, I want not gold, nor costly gear, Oh! be my bride, thou weeping fair, And I will build a tomb most rare, My love needs not a tomb so rare, Now go. sir knight, now go thy ways— And then return, in some few days, And strew the flower, and pluck the thorn, So may some hand thy turf adorn Stay till I have deck'd my bridal bed, This dirge is certainly not ancient; but it is no treason to say it is better than if it were. We cannot suppress a suspicion that these legendary pieces flowed from the pen of a poet to whom neither his own nor this generation has been altogether just. We mean William Julius Mickle, the translator of the Lusiad. His Sir Martyn, written in imitation of Spenser's manner, with much of the copious and luxuriant description of his original, shows his attachment to the study of the ancient poetry of Britain; and his two beautiful ballads, entitled Hengist and Mey, and the Sorceress, have the same harmony of versification, the same simple and affecting turn of expression, with the Mr Mickle should have been a friend of the elder Mr Evans, as we believe, we consider that circumstance, joined to internal evidence, as sufficient to ascertain his property in the ballads in question. We have also to complain, that in publishing some other imitations of the ancient ballads, the authors' names have been withheld where, perhaps, they were more easily attainable than in the case just stated. Thus the ingenious Mr Henry Mackenzie (author of the Man of Feeling) is well known to have written the beautiful Scottish ballad entitled Kenneth; and Michael Bruce that of Sir John Ross. The ballad of the Laidley Worm of Spindleston Heughs is also known to have been, in a very great measure, the production of the Rev. Mr Lambe, late vicar of Norham, and editor of the Battle of Floddenfield. It is founded upon a prevailing tradition in Bamboroughshire, and the author has interwoven a few stanzas of the original song concerning it, which begins, "Bambro' castle's built full high, It's built of marble stone, In revising his father's publication, Mr R. Evans has, with great judgment, discarded a number of sing-song imitations of the ancient ballad by Jerningham, Robinson, and other flimsy pretenders, who, seduced by the apparent ease of the task, ventured to lay their hand upon the minstrel lyre. For a different reason, he has omitted the contributions which his father levied upon Goldsmith, Gray, and other eminent moderns, whose works are in every one's hand. By this exclusion he has made room for a selection of genuine ancient poetry, compiled, by his own industry, from the hoarded treasures of black-letter ballads. It is no disgrace to Mr Evans, that these veterans, whom he has introduced to recruit his diminished ranks, are, generally speaking, more respectable for their antiquity than for any thing else. Percy, Ellis, and other editors of taste and genius, had long ago anticipated Mr Evans's labours, and left him but the refuse of the market. Some of the ballads, indeed, exhibit such wretched doggrel as serves, more than the dissertations of a thousand Ritsons, to degrade the character of our ancient song-enditers. The "Warning to Youth," for example, "shewing the lewd life of a merchant's sonne of London, and the misery that at the last he sustained by his notoriousnesse," might, notwithstanding the valuable moral attached to it, have been left, without injury to the public, to "dust and mere oblivion." Had we known Mr Evans's curiosity in such matters, we could have supplied him with as much stale poetry of a similar description as would have made his four volumes twenty. him into publishing what is no otherwise valuable than as it is old, a prejudice by which all antiquarian editors are influenced in a greater or less degree, we have to applaud the diligence with which he has traced and recovered some beautiful and some curious pieces of poetry, which possess intrinsic merit and interest. Among the former we distinguish the address to a disappointed, or rather a forsaken lover, which has, we think, a turn of passion that is new, upon a very thread-bare subject. I am so farre from pittying thee, That wearing willow doth imply, For once thou wert where thon wouldst be, I doe defie both boughe and roote, Makes purgatorie seeme a toye: I have spent all my golden time, And now alas it is too late, The Symptoms of Love," p. 246, is another very pretty song, and there are many scattered through the volumes which have considerable elegance of expression, or a quaintness rendered venerable by antiquity, and which, like the grotesque carving on a gothic niche, has a pleasing effect, though irreconcilable with the strict rules of taste. These praises apply chiefly to the songs and minor pieces of lyrical poetry. The only ancient ballad, actually connected with history and manners, which Mr Evans's labours have presented to us for the first time, is the murder of the Wests, by the sons of the Lord Darsy. Its chief merit is its curiosity. Among the poems which are deservedly inserted, we cannot help remarking that entitled "The Felon Sow and the Freeres of Rich mond," as Lelonging to a class of compositions which has been but lightly discussed by our antiquaries-we mean the burlesque romance of the middle ages, with which, doubtless, the minstrel and tale-teller relieved the uniformity of their heroic ditties. In these ludicrous poems, which are a kind of parody upon the metrical romances, churchmen and peasants are introduced imitating the knightly pastimes of chivalry; and their awkward mishaps and absurd blunders must have been matter of excellent mirth to the doughty knights and gallant barons who listened to the tale. Thus, in the case before us, the felon sow was the undisturbed tenant of the woods of Rokeby, and the romantic banks of the Greta-her size and ferocity are de |