THOMAS THE RHYMER. TRADITIONAL VERSION. Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, (iv. 117.) Given from a copy, obtained from a lady residing not far from Ercildoune, corrected and enlarged by one in Mrs. Brown's MSS. TRUE THOMAS lay on Huntlie bank; And there he saw a ladye bright, Come riding down by the Eildon Tree. Her shirt was o' the grass-green silk, True Thomas, he pull'd aff his cap, And louted low down to his knee, "All hail, thou mighty Queen of Heaven! For thy peer on earth I never did see." "O no, O no, Thomas," she said, "That name does not belang to me; I am but the Queen of fair Elfland, That am hither come to visit thee. 66 66 Harp and carp, Thomas," she said; Harp and carp along wi' me; And if ye dare to kiss my lips, Sure of your bodie I will be." "Betide me weal, betide me woe, "Now, ye maun go wi' me," she said; "True Thomas, ye maun go wi' me; And ye maun serve me seven years, Thro' weal or woe as may chance to be." She mounted on her milk-white steed; The steed flew swifter than the wind. O they rade on, and farther on ; The steed gaed swifter than the wind; 1 That weird, &c.-That destiny shall never frighten me. 66 Light down, light down, now, true Thomas, And I will shew you ferlies three. "O see ye not yon narrow road, So thick beset with thorns and briers? That is the path of righteousness, Though after it but few enquires. "And see ye not that braid braid road, That lies across that lily leven? That is the path of wickedness, Though some call it the road to heaven. "And see not ye that bonny road, That winds about the fernie brae? That is the road to fair Elfland, Where thou and I this night maun gae. "But, Thomas, ye maun hold your tongue, For, if you speak word in Elflyn land, O they rade on, and farther on, And they waded through rivers aboon the knee, And they saw neither sun nor moon, But they heard the roaring of the sea. It was mirk mirk night, and there was nae stern light, And they waded through red blude to the knee; For a' the blude that's shed on earth Rins through the springs o' that countrie. Syne they came on to a garden green, It will give thee the tongue that can never lie." "My tongue is mine ain," true Thomas said; I neither dought to buy nor sell, "I dought neither speak to prince or peer, He has gotten a coat of the even cloth, 1 The traditional commentary upon this ballad informs us, that the apple was the produce of the fatal Tree of Knowledge, and that the garden was the terrestrial paradise. The repugnance of Thomas to be debarred the use of falsehood, when he might find it convenient, has a comic effect.-SCOTT. APPENDIX. THE reader is here presented, from an old, and unfortunately an imperfect MS., with the undoubted original of Thomas the Rhymer's intrigue with the Queen of Faery. It will afford great amusement to those who would study the nature of traditional poetry, and the changes effected by oral tradition, to compare this ancient romance with the foregoing ballad. same incidents are narrated, even the expression is often the same; yet the poems are as different in appearance, as if the older tale had been regularly and systematically modernized by a poet of the present day. Incipit Prophesia Thomæ de Erseldoun. In a lande as I was lent, In the gryking of the day, In Huntle bankys me for to play; The |