"The following story, which is frequently related by the peasants of Scotland, will illustrate the imaginary danger of leaving the door ajar. In former times, a man and his wife lived in a solitary cottage, on one of the extensive Border fells. One day the husband died suddenly; and his wife, who was equally afraid of staying alone by the corpse, or leaving the dead body by itself, repeatedly went to the door, and looked anxiously over the lonely moor for the sight of some person approaching. In her confusion and alarm she accidentally left the door ajar, when the corpse suddenly started up, and sat in the bed, frowning and grinning at her frightfully. She sat alone, crying bitterly, unable to avoid the fascination of the dead man's eye, and too much terrified to break the sullen silence, till a Catholic priest, passing over the wild, entered the cottage. He first set the door quite open, then put his little finger in his mouth, and said the paternoster backwards; when the horrid look of the corpse relaxed, it fell back on the bed, and behaved itself as a dead man ought to do. "The ballad is given from tradition. I have been informed by a lady, [Miss Joanna Baillie,] of the highest literary eminence, that she has heard a ballad on the same subject, in which the scene was laid upon the banks of the Clyde. The chorus was, "O Bothwell banks bloom bonny," and the watching of the dead corpse was said to have taken place in Bothwell church." SCOTT. Of a' the maids o' fair Scotland, The fairest was Marjorie; And young Benjie was her ae true love, And a dear true love was he. And wow but they were lovers dear, 5 And loved fu' constantlie; But aye the mair when they fell out, The sairer was their plea. And they hae quarrell'd on a day, Till Marjorie's heart grew wae; 10 And she said she'd chuse another luve, And let young Benjie gae. And he was stout, and proud-hearted, And thought o't bitterlie; And he's gane by the wan moonlight, 15 To meet his Marjorie. "O open, open, my true love, O open, and let me in!"-- "I darena open, young Benjie, My three brothers are within."-- 20 "Ye lied, ye lied, ye bonny burd, Sae loud's I hear ye lie; As I came by the Lowden banks, They bade gude e'en to me. "But fare ye weel, my ae fause love, 25 That I have loved sae lang! It sets ye chuse another love, And let young Benjie gang."-- Then Marjorie turn'd her round about, The tear blinding her ee,-- 30 "I darena, darena let thee in, But I'll come down to thee."--