Frazers, it is believed) were powerful and warlike, and the baron
had had fighting enough in the holy wars. The event was, that he
believed, or seemed to believe, the tale, and remained contented
with the child with whom his wife and the Tweed had generously
presented him. The only circumstance which preserved the memory of
the incident was, that the youth retained the name of Tweed, or
Tweedie. The baron, meanwhile, could not, as the old Scotch song
says, "Keep the cradle rowing," and the Tweed apparently thought
one natural son was family enough for a decent Presbyterian lover;
and so little gall had the baron in his composition, that having
bred up the young Tweed as his heir while he lived, he left him in
that capacity when he died, and the son of the river-god founded
the family of Drummelzier and others, from whom have flowed, in
the phrase of the Ettrick Shepherd, "many a brave fellow, and many
a bauld feat."
The tale of the Noble Moringer is somewhat of the same nature--it
exists in a collection of German popular songs, entitled, Sammlung
Deutschen Volkslieder, Berlin, 1807; published by Messrs. Busching
and Von der Hagen. The song is supposed to be extracted from a
manuscript chronicle of Nicholas Thomann, chaplain to St. Leonard
in Wissenhorn, and dated 1533. The ballad, which is popular in
Germany, is supposed from the language, to have been composed in
the fifteenth century. The Noble Moringer, a powerful baron of
Germany, about to set out on a pilgrimage to the land of St.
Thomas, with the geography of which we are not made acquainted,
resolves to commit his castle, dominions, and lady, to the vassal
who should pledge him to keep watch over them till the seven years
of his pilgrimage were accomplished. His chamberlain, an elderly
and a cautious man, declines the trust, observing, that seven
days, instead of seven years, would be the utmost space to which
he would consent to pledge himself for the fidelity of any woman.
The esquire of the Noble Moringer confidently accepts the trust
refused by the chamberlain, and the baron departs on his
pilgrimage. The seven years are now elapsed, all save a single day
and night, when, behold, a vision descends on the noble pilgrim as
he sleeps in the land of the stranger.
"It was the noble Moringer, within an orchard slept,
When on the Baron's slumbering sense a boding vision crept,
And whispered in his ear a voice,'
'Tis time. Sir Knight, to wake--
Thy lady and thy heritage another master take.
"'Thy tower another banner knows, thy steeds another rein,
And stoop them to another's will, thy gallant vassal train;
And she, the lady of thy love, so faithful once and fair,
This night, within thy father's hall, she weds Marstetten's heir.'"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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