22 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[July 14. 1855. 



Collection, another version, in some respects more 

 perfect (thoujih in others somewhat doubtful), has 

 appeared in Mr. Buchan's Ballads of the I^orth, 

 ■vol. i. p. 91. (Some verses of it were previously 

 printed in Motherwell's Minstrelsy, p. Ixxxi.) 

 But if we look to the notes of Mr. Dixon on this 

 piece, we find no mention at all of its having ever 

 appeared in print (though, in fact, " Proud Lady 

 Margaret," in the Border Minstrelsy, is only an- 

 other version of the same ballad, as already re- 

 jnarked by Motherwell). Nor is this the case 

 •with this song only, but 



The Dixon Collection, Xo. VI., has previously been pub- 

 lished by Mr. Buchan in Ballads of the North, vol. ii. 

 p. 222. : 



„ No. VII. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 217. 



„ No. VIII. „ „ Vol.ii. p. 194. 



„ No. IX. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 67. 



„ No.X. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 198. 



„ No. XI. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 201. 



„ No. XII. „ „ Vol. i. p. 245. 



„ No. XIII. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 203. 



„ No. XIV. „ „ Vol. ii. p. 200. 



Several of those are veriatim the same in Mr. 

 Dixon's and in Mr. Buchan's publications, simply 

 because they have been printed from the same 

 authority, the Buchan MSS. But with the excep- 

 tions of the two cases before mentioned (Nos. X. 

 and XL), no mention is made of their having 

 been published seventeen years before in a work 

 that is of so much greater consequence in this 

 line, tban is Mr. Dixon's publication. 



Now this is not fair. Mr. Dixon shows in two 

 instances that he knows the fact of Mr. Buchan's 

 editorship, and that ^le even knows and has used 

 his last edition ; but why then not mention this 

 in the preface ? And why not tell in the other 

 eight instances that the ballad, now edited from 

 Mr. Buchan's MSS., has been published by the 

 great collector himself seventeen or twenty-six 

 years ago ? All this does not look well. It cer- 

 tainly appears as if Mr. Dixon did not wish any 

 comparison to be drawn between his fairy volume, 

 ■with the seventeen ballad versions, and the great 

 published Buchan Collection of 145 ballads, among 

 which most of his seventeen are to be found, with 

 little or no difference. 



What now ought to be done is this, that the 

 •whole ballad portion of Mr. Buchan's MSS. should 

 be published from the MSS., but with all the 

 additions and va7-ice lectiones of the published 

 collections of Mr. Buchan thrown into the notes. 

 There are reasons to suppose the published 

 •versions to be in some respects less authentic and 

 genuine than are the MSS. from which they were 

 taken ; there Mr. Buchan has kept close to the 

 form in which they were taken down from oral 

 tradition ; but in publishing them himself he has 

 110 doubt taken soms liberties with them, to make 

 them more suitable to the taste of the day. 

 Therefore we must have the MSS. without any 



^O. 298.] 



alteration. But, on the other hand, many of the 

 differences between the written and the printed 

 copy may be derived from tradition, and therefore 

 ought to be preserved. This would be a fine task 

 for the Warton Society, and would be received 

 by all friends of northern folk lore with a pleasure 

 and gratitude only surpassed by that which would 

 hail the appearance in print of the mysterious 

 Percy Manuscript of Ballads, which now during 

 just one hundred years has been partly expected, 

 and partly suspected by the friends of folk lore all 

 over the world. It was in the year 1755 that 

 Bishop Percy, by his Heliques, gave the first im- 

 pulse to that interest for popular poetry, which 

 has since spread over the whole continent, and has 

 called forth the lovely bloom of the popular poetry 

 of all nations. Now it would no doubt be the 

 most worthy manner of solemnizing the centennial 

 of the British Keliques, if the Warton Society 

 would also edit {verbatim et literatim) for the first 

 time that inestimable relique, the chief source of 

 the great Percy publication, and of the universal 

 movement it has so happily occasioned. 



SVEND GrUNBTVIG. 



Copenhagen. 



JUNIUS, MH. GEORGE -WOOBrAI-L, AND THE REV. 

 HARTWELX HORNE. 



The one fact in your Note to the letter of Ver*- 

 TAUR (Vol. xi., p. 338.) is conclusive ; otherwise 

 many facts might be added. But any statement 

 by Mr. George W^oodfall, the son of H. S. Wood- 

 fall, vouched for by Mr. Hartwell Home, will be 

 thought by your readers entitled to especial con- 

 sideration. It may be well, therefore, to examine 

 that statement, as it may help us to conclusions as 

 to the value of other statements made in the edi- 

 tion of 1812, which rest on the authority of Mr. 

 George Woodfall, — a highly respectable man, but 

 a man, be it remembered, not accustomed to weigh 

 evidence — not habitually to distinguish between 

 what we believe and what we know, a refinement 

 which is the result of a life of critical inquiry, — 

 and yet a man who is considered by most persons 

 as an oracle on the subject of Junius, a subject 

 about which, in my opinion, he knew very little \. 

 nothing, indeed, but what he picked up hurriedly^ 

 when collecting materials for the edition of 1 8 12. 



On the authority, then, of Mr. George Wood- 

 fall, Mr. Home informs us that an edition of 

 Junius " without date," and having an " index," — 



" is the first edition of the letters of Junius in a collective 

 form ; that the proof-sheets were corrected by Junius him- 

 self; and in p. xx. of the preface, and in p. 25. of this 

 volume, there are two manuscript corrections made by 

 Junius." 



The true history of the edition without date 

 was, as I believe, given long since in " N. & Q." 



