"Circumstantial evidence," says Pratt, "is also so far in favour of the traditionary record as to render it hazardous to set it aside as wholly unworthy of credit. Thus, the _Hawkestone_ at St Madoes, the well-known boundary of the ancient possessions of the Hays of Erroll in Perthshire, is mentioned by Boethius as existing in his day (anno. 1500), and as having been set up immediately after the defeat of the Danes, in 980. Also the _Stone_ so carefully preserved at Slains Castle, and which from time immemorial has been venerated by the family as that on which their ancestor sat down after the conflict. For the origin of these and similar traditions it would be difficult to account, had there been no foundation whatever for the narrative of Luncarty." Gilbert de Haya, Regent of Scotland during the minority of Alexander II., married a daughter of William Comyn, Earl of Buchan, about 1255. The old Castle of Slains belonged originally to the Earls of Buchan, and became afterwards, for many generations, the seat of the Earls of Erroll. There is some doubt whether the Castle owed its erection to Fergus, who lived in the time of William the Lion (1065), or to the Comyns who succeeded to this earldom through marriage with Marjory, only daughter of Fergus, and Countess of Buchan in her own right. Again,--Saladin, the famous Sultan of Syria, fought Guy de Lusignan, King of Jerusalem, in 1187. Then Phillip Augustus of France, Richard I. of England, with many others, and among them numbers of our Scottish nobility, deemed themselves called upon to fly to the rescue of the Holy Sepulchre, and by a third crusade endeavour to wrest its possession from the infidel. From these facts considerable doubt arises as to which of the "gallant Hays" was the hero of the following ballad. It could hardly be Gilbert, who married the daughter of the Earl of Buchan. If it was, then he could scarcely have been in the third crusade; and there are grave doubts as to the Lady Claribel having been the "child of the Elfin Queen." There may, however, be no doubt that she was beautiful as a Princess, for beauty is no rare qualification of the ladies of the district; nor may it be improbable that she waylaid and captured the Hay in one of the many knightly journeyings in search of adventures which the nobles of those days undertook. The ladies of those far-off times did many strange things--at least, what now-a-days would be considered such; nevertheless, from the ballad it appears she "made a good wife for all that." _It is feared_, under all the circumstances, that, as in many other legendary tales, considerable liberty has been taken with fact in favour of fancy. THE FAIRY BRIDE. FROM THE RECITATION OF A COLLECTOR OF BALLADS OF THE OLDEN TIME. I.