“There was three ladies in a ha’, Fine flowers i’ the valley; There came three lords among them a’, Hi’ the red, green, and the yellow.” Now, the remarkable thing is, that there is still sung in Cornwall--or was, till quite recently--a form of the ballad with a burden like this latter. It begins-- “There was a woman and she was a widow, O the red, the green, and the yellow! And daughters had three as the elm tree, The flowers they blow in the valley.” with this chorus:-- “The harp, the lute, the fife, the flute, and the cymbal. Sweet goes the treble violin, The flowers that blow in the valley.” How is it possible that a ballad sung in two forms in Scotland, and recovered there in a fragmentary condition, should be known in very similar forms in Cornwall? To suppose that the two versions were carried from the Highlands to the Land’s End, so as to have become popular, is inconceivable. It is more likely that the same English ballad found its way both north and south-west, and when it had been displaced elsewhere, remained in the extremities of the island. The burden in each case is clearly that which marked the melody. We very much wish that the Scottish airs, to which these ballads were sung, had been preserved, that they might be compared with those to which they were sung in Cornwall. The burden in each case has nothing to do with the story, but it seems to indicate that the same ballad in its two forms, to two independent airs, was carried all over Great Britain at some period unknown. The same ballad was also sung in Cheshire at the close of last century, and also in Ireland. Another specimen given by Mr. Gilbert is that of the “Three Sisters.” “There were three sisters fair and bright, Jennifer, Gentle and Rosemaree; And they three loved one valiant knight; As the doo (dove) flies over the mulberry tree.”[36] The same is found in broadside, in the Pepysian and other collections, and as “The Unco Knicht’s Wooing” in Scotland. Take again the ballad of “The Elfin Knight” or “The Wind hath blown my Plaid away.” This is found in Scotland, but also as a broadside in the Pepysian collection; it was the subject within the memory of man of a sort of play in farmhouses in Cornwall; it is found in a more or less fragmentary condition all over England. The same ballad is found in German, in Danish, in Wend--and the story in Tyrol, in Siberia, and Thibet.