"The ley likesna the simmer shower Nor girse the morning dew, Better, dear Lady Maisrie, Than Chil Ether loves you."' But for this, among other reasons, the genuine antiquity of the ballad is under some suspicion. In modern fiction or drama the lady hesitates between the opposing forces of love and of family pride and duty; the old influences in her life do not yield to the new without a struggle. But of struggle or indecision the ballad heroine knows, or at least says, nothing. A glance, a whispered word, a note of harp or horn, and she flings down her 'silken seam,' and whether she be king's daughter or beggar maid she obeys the spell, and follows the enchanter to greenwood or to broomy hill, to the ends of the earth, and to the gates of death. For when the gallant knight and his 'fair may' ride away, prying eyes are upon them; black care and red vengeance climb up behind them and keep them company. _The Douglas Tragedy_ may be selected for its terseness and dramatic strength, for the romance and pathos inwoven in the very names and scenes with which it is associated, as the type of a favourite story which under various titles--_Earl Brand_ and the _Child of Elle_ among the rest--has, time beyond knowledge, captivated the imagination and drawn the tears of ballad-lovers. In the best-known Scots version--that which Sir Walter Scott has recovered for us, and which bears some touches of his rescuing hand--it is the lady-mother who gives the alarm that the maiden has fled under cloud of night with her lover: 'Rise up, rise up, my seven bauld sons, And put on your armour so bright, And take better care of your youngest sister, For your eldest 's awa' the last night.' In English variants, it is the sour serving-man or false bower-woman who gives the alarm and sets the chase in motion. But there are other differences that enter into the very essence of the story, and express the diverse feeling of the Scottish and the English ballad. In the latter there is a pretty scene of entreaty and reconciliation; the lady's tears soften the harsh will of the father, and stay the lifted blade of the lover, and all ends merry as a marriage bell. But in the Scottish ballads fathers and lovers are not given to the melting mood. In sympathy with the scenery and atmosphere, the ballad spirit is with us sterner and darker; and just as the materials of that tender little idyll of faithful love, _The Three Ravens_, are in Scottish hands transformed into the drear, wild dirge of _The Twa Corbies_, the gallant adventure of the _Child of Elle_ turns inevitably to tragedy by Douglas Water and Yarrow. But how much more true to this soul of romance is the choice of the northern minstrel! Lady Margaret, as she holds Lord William's bridle-rein while he deals those strokes so 'wondrous sair' at her nearest kin, is a figure that will haunt the 'stream of sorrow' as long as verse has power to move the hearts of men: