he company?'

6.
'I've sene lord, and I've sene laird,
And knights of high degree,
Bot a fairer face than Young Waters
Mine eyne did never see.'

7.
Out then spack the jealous king,
And an angry man was he:
'O if he had bin twice as fair,
You micht have excepted me.'

8.
'You're neither laird nor lord,' she says,
'Bot the king that wears the crown;
There is not a knight in fair Scotland
Bot to thee maun bow down.'

9.
For a' that she coud do or say,
Appeas'd he wad nae bee,
Bot for the words which she had said,
Young Waters he maun die.

10.
They hae ta'en Young Waters,
And put fetters to his feet;
They hae ta'en Young Waters, and
Thrown him in dungeon deep.

11.
'Aft have I ridden thro' Stirling town,
In the wind bot and the weit;
Bot I neir rade thro' Stirling town
Wi' fetters at my feet.

12.
'Aft have I ridden thro' Stirling town,
In the wind bot and the rain;
Bot I neir rade thro' Stirling town
Neir to return again.'

13.
They hae ta'en to the heiding-hill
His young son in his craddle,
And they hae ta'en to the heiding-hill
His horse bot and his saddle.

14.
They hae ta'en to heiding-hill
His lady fair to see,
And for the words the queen had spoke
Young Waters he did die.

[Annotations:
1.2: 'round tables,' an unknown game.
4.1: 'graith'd,' harnessed, usually; here perhaps shod.
6.1: 'laird,' a landholder, below the degree of knight.--+Jamieson+.
13.1: 'heiding-hill': _i.e._ heading (beheading) hill. The place of
execution was anciently an artificial hillock.--+Percy+.]

BARBARA ALLAN

+The Text+ is from Allan Ramsay's _Tea-Table Miscellany_ (1763). It was
not included in the first edition (1724-1727), nor until the ninth
edition in 1740, when to the original three volumes there was added a
fourth, in which this ballad appeared. There is also a Scotch version,
_Sir John Grehme and Barbara Allan_. Percy printed both in the
_Reliques_, vol. iii.

+The Story+ of Barbara Allan's scorn of her lover and subsequent regret
has always been popular. Pepys records of Mrs. Knipp, 'In perfect
pleasure I was to hear her sing, and especially her little Scotch song
of Barbary Allen' (January 2, 1665-6). Goldsmith's words are equally
well known: 'The music of the finest singer is dissonance to what I felt
when an old dairymaid sung me into tears