But young

Johnstone had a little wee sword,

Hung low down by his gair,

And he stabbed it in fair Annet's breast,

A deep wound and a sair.

What aileth thee now, dear Johnstone?
What aileth thee at me?

Hast thou not got my father's gold,
Bot and my mither's fee?"

"Now live, now live, my dear Ladye, Now live but half an hour,

And there's no a leech in a' Scotland

But shall be in thy bower."

"How can I live, how shall I live?

Young Johnstone, do not you see

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The red, red drops o' my bonny heart's blood Rin trinkling down my knee?

"But take thy harp into thy hand, And harp out owre yon plain,

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100

105

96. Buchan's version furnishes the necessary explanation of Young Johnstone's apparent cruelty:

And ne'er think mair on thy true love
Than if she had never been."

He hadna weel been out o' the stable,

And on his saddle set,

Till four-and-twenty broad arrows
Were thrilling in his heart.

110

YOUNG BENJIE.

FROM the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, iii. 10. Bondsey and Maisry, another version of the same story, from Buchan's collection, is given in the Appendix.

"In this ballad the reader will find traces of a singular superstition, not yet altogether discredited in the wilder parts of Scotland. The lykewake, or watching a dead body, in itself a melancholy office, is rendered, in the idea of the assistants, more dismally awful, by the mysterious horrors of superstition. In the interval betwixt death and interment, the disembodied spirit is supposed to hover round its mortal habitation, and, if invoked by certain rites, retains the power of communicating, through its organs, the cause of its dissolution. Such inquiries, however, are always dangerous, and never to be resorted to, unless the deceased is suspected to have suffered foul play, as it is called. It is the more unsafe to tamper with this charm in an unauthorized manner, because the inhabitants of the infernal regions are, at such periods, peculiarly active. One of the most potent ceremonies in the charm, for

causing the dead body to speak, is, setting the door ajar, or half open. On this account, the peasants of Scotland sedulously avoid leaving the door ajar, while a corpse lies in the house. The door must either be left wide open, or quite shut; but the first is always preferred, on account of the exercise of hospitality usual on such occasions. The attendants must be likewise careful never to leave the corpse for a moment alone, or, if it is left alone, to avoid, with a degree of superstitious horror, the first sight of it.

"The following story, which is frequently related by the peasants of Scotland, will illustrate the imaginary danger of leaving the door ajar. In former times, a man and his wife lived in a solitary cottage, on one of the extensive Border fells. One day the husband died suddenly; and his wife, who was equally afraid of staying alone by the corpse, or leaving the dead body by itself, repeatedly went to the door, and looked anxiously over the lonely moor for the sight of some person approaching. In her confusion and alarm she accidentally left the door ajar, when the corpse suddenly started up, and sat in the bed, frowning and grinning at her frightfully. She sat alone, crying bitterly, unable to avoid the fascination of the dead man's eye, and too much terrified to break the sullen silence, till a Catholic priest, passing over the wild, entered the cot tage. He first set the door quite open, then put his little finger in his mouth, and said the paternoster backwards; when the horrid look of the corpse relaxed, it fell back on the bed, and behaved itself as a dead man ought to do.

"The ballad is given from tradition. I have been informed by a lady, [Miss Joanna Baillie,] of the high est literary eminence, that she has heard a ballad on

the same subject, in which the scene was laid upon the panks of the Clyde. The chorus was,

"O Bothwell banks bloom bouny,"

and the watching of the dead corpse was said to have taken place in Bothwell church. SCOTT.

OF a' the maids o' fair Scotland,

The fairest was Marjorie;

And young Benjie was her ae true love,
And a dear true love was he.

And wow but they were lovers dear,

And loved fu' constantlie;

But aye the mair when they fell out,
The sairer was their plea.

And they hae quarrell'd on a day,
Till Marjorie's heart grew wae;
And she said she'd chuse another luve,
And let young Benjie gae.

And he was stout, and proud-hearted,

And thought o't bitterlie;

And he's gane by the wan moonlight,

To meet his Marjorie.

“O open, open, my true love,

O open, and let me in! "

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