The ballad goes on to describe how problems were bandied between the Elfin Knight and a lady. The one on whom an impossible task was imposed stood acquitted if he devised a task of no less difficulty, which must first be performed by his opponent. Such flytings go far back in literature. In this case the Elfin Knight staked his plaid, that is his life, on receiving the favour of the lady, and he propounded to her three problems, viz. of making a sack without a seam, of washing it in a well without water, and of hanging it to dry on a tree that never blossomed. In reply, she claimed that he should plough an acre of land with a ram's horn, that he should sow it with a peppercorn, and that he should reap it with a sickle of leather. The problems perhaps had a recondite meaning, and the ballad-monger probably found them ready to hand. For Child cites a version of the ballad in which the same flyting took place between a woman and "the auld, auld man," who threatened to take her as his own, and who turned out to be Death. The idea of a wooer staking his life on winning a lady is less primitive than that of Death securing a victim. The same tasks without their romantic setting are preserved in the form of a simple dialogue, in the nursery collections of _c._ 1783 and 1810. In this case also it is the question of a wooer. _Man speaks._ Can you make me a cambrick shirt, Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme, Without any seam or needlework? And you shall be a true lover of mine. Can you wash it in yonder well? Parsley, etc., Where never spring water or rain ever fell. Can you dry it on yonder thorn, Which never bore blossom since Adam was born? _Maiden speaks._ Now you have asked me questions three, I hope you will answer as many for me. Can you find me an acre of land, Between the salt water and the sea sand? Can you plow it with a ram's horn, And sow it all over with peppercorn? Can you reap it with a sickle of leather, And bind it up with a peacock's feather? When you have done and finished your work, Then come to me for your cambrick shirt. (_c._ 1783, p. 10.) On the face of it, it hardly seems likely that this version is descended from the romantic ballad. The tasks that are here imposed on the man are set also in the form of a boast in a nursery song, in which they have so entirely lost their meaning as to represent a string of impossibilities.