214 FURTHER NOTES CONCERNING SIR WALTER SCOTT 



completed it from one of the two manuscript collections he had 

 the use of ; the oral version, as might be expected, has many 

 more local allusions than the other. The second ballad is very 

 cleverly and naturally made up by himself of the prophecies 

 attributed to Thomas the Rhymer, strung together into a poem 

 filling three or four pages ; and the third is his own beautiful 

 version of the sufficiently picturesque legend of Thomas's recall 

 to Fairyland by the sign of a pair of deer, which enter the 

 village without fear. 



Obviously, the only one of the three which can be called 

 genuine, in the way of legend, is the first ; and that I consider 

 is. The practice adopted by Sir Walter of completing a ballad 

 by putting together verses from different copies, was not 

 according to the scientific method of the present day, nor in fact 

 to that of his own; but as 'long as he did not consciously add 

 anything of his own, it seems all that can be required, publish- 

 ing, as he did, a collection of ballads as light literature, and 

 selected to suit the taste of the day. Motherwell's collection, 

 which was conscientiously published some time after as a 

 corrective to the Border Minstrelsy, is far from being a pleasant 

 book. A considerable number of Sir Walter's were really taken 

 down from oral tradition, while others were well-known in print 

 as broadsides. 



The point in question is this ; when Thomas the Rhymer is 

 carried off by the Queen of the Fairies (the first time) they pass 

 through a sort of middle region of darkness, of starless night, 

 where, it is said — 



" It was mirk mirk night, and there was nae stern light. 

 And they waded through red blood to the knee ; 

 For all the blood that's shed on earth 



Runs through the springs of that countrie." 

 This certainly has a mythological, if not allegorical sound ; 

 and Professor Veitch says, I think, in connection with the wild 

 deer, which re-appear in the later stories about Merlin, that Sir 

 Walter must have found the river of blood in some of his 

 German diablerie ; apparently supposing the first part of Thomas 

 the Rhymer to have been written by him. The interesting 

 point is, that it is not German, so far as known, but Breton- 

 Armorican ; though it could not have been known to Sir Walter, 

 at least from that source, it occurs twice in Villemarque's 

 collection of the ballads of Brittany ; and the two ballads 



