The English and Scottish Popular Ballads :: :: University of Virginia Library

“Scotch Ballads, Materials for Border Minstrelsy,” No 92, Abbotsford. Communicated to Scott, 7th January, 1804, by Rev. George Paxton, Kilmaurs, near Kilmarnock, Ayrshire (afterwards professor of divinity at Edinburgh); from the mouth of Jean Milne, his “aged mother, formerly an unwearied singer of Scotish songs.”

1

‘My father was the Duke of York,
My mother a gay ladye,
And I myself a daintie dame;
The queen she sent for me.

2

‘But the queen's meat it was sae sweet,
And her clothing was sae rare,
It made me long for a young man's bed,
And I rued it evermair.’

3

But word is up, and word is down,
Amang the ladyes a',
That Marie's born a babe sin yestreen,
That babe it is awa.

4

But the queen she gat wit of this,
She calld for a berry-brown gown,
And she's awa to Marie's bower,
The bower that Marie lay in.

5

‘Open your door, my Marie,’ she says,
‘My bonny and fair Marie;
They say you have born a babe sin yestreen,
That babe I fain wad see.’

6

‘It is not sae wi me, madam,
It is not sae wi me;
It is but a fit of my sair sickness,
That oft times troubles me.’

7

‘Get up, get up, my Marie,’ she says,
‘My bonny and fair Marie,
And we'll away to Edinburgh town,
And try the verity.’

8

Slowly, slowly, gat she up,
And slowly pat she on,
And slowly went she to that milk-steed,
To ride to Edinburgh town.

9

But when they cam to Edinburgh,
And in by the Towbooth stair,
There was mony a virtuous ladye
Letting the tears fa there.

10

‘Why weep ye sae for me, madams?
Why weep ye sae for me?
For sin ye brought me to this town
This death ye gar me die.’

11

When she cam to the Netherbow Port,
She gae loud laughters three;
But when she cam to the gallows-foot
The tear blinded her ee.

12

‘Yestreen the queen had four Maries,
The night she'll hae but three;
There was Marie Seton, and Marie Beatoun,
And Marie Carmichael, and me.

13

‘My love he was a pottinger,
Mony drink he gae me,
And a' to put back that bonnie babe,
But alas! it wad na do.

14

‘I pat that bonny babe in a box,
And set it on the sea;
O sink ye, swim ye, bonny bable!
Ye's neer get mair o me.

15

‘O all ye jolly sailors,
That sail upon the sea,

Let neither my father nor mother ken
The death that I maun die.

16

‘But if my father and mother kend
The death that I maun die,
O mony wad be the good red guineas
That wad be gien for me.’