hem, even were discussion and comparison
part of the present plan. Such treatment is apt to reduce a book on
ballads and balladists to what Charles G. Leland terms 'mere logarithmic
tables of variants.' First came the harvesters; and then those who were
content to glean where the others had left. As matter of course and of
necessity the readings, and even the structure of the pieces picked up
from oral recitation and singing, presented endless points of difference
according to the locality and to the individual singer or collector. As
has been said, each old piece of popular poetry, before it has been
fixed in print, and even after, takes a certain part of its colour and
character from the minds and memories through which it has been
strained. As an illustration of this, in another field, one might
mention that Pastor Hurt, when he set about, a few years ago, gathering
the fragments of Esthonian folk literature, obtained contributions from
633 different collectors, most of them simple peasants, and as the
result of three and a half years' work, he brought together 'of epics,
lyrics, wedding songs, etc., upwards of 20,000 specimens; of tales about
3000; of proverbs about 18,000; of riddles, about 20,000, besides a
large collection of magical formulae, superstitions, and the like.' These
figures include variants of the same tale or ballad theme, of which
there were in some cases as many as 160.

The Scottish ballads may scarce be so multitudinous and protean a host
as this. But the search for them, and the choice of them when
discovered, have given infinite exercise to the industry, the judgment,
and the patience of successive editors; and literature has no more
curious and romantic chapter than that which deals with ballad
collecting and collectors. The latter, in Scotland as elsewhere, have
not been free from the human liability to err--few men have been less
so. As Percy admitted _Hardyknut_ and other examples of the
pseudo-antique among his specimens of 'Old Romance Poetry,' Scott's
critical acumen did not avail to detect brazen forgeries of Surtees,
like _Barthram's Dirge_ and _The Death of Featherstonhaugh_. In Cromek's
_Relics of Galloway Song_ were somewhat palpable 'fakements' of Allan
Cunningham; William Motherwell and Peter Buchan made their egregious
blunders, and even such careful and experienced antiquaries as Joseph
Ritson and David Laing slipped on the dark and broken and intricate
paths which they sought