There is an old Scottish ballad, “Hynd Horn,”--perhaps having a common origin with the Bohemian lay on which Scott based The Noble Moringer,[738]--which brings out the idea of a covenant-ring having the power to indicate to its wearer the fidelity of its giver; corresponding with the popular belief to that effect, suggested by Bacon.[739] Hynd Horn has won the heart of the king’s daughter, and the king sends him over the sea, as a means of breaking up the match. As he sets out Hynd Horn carries with him a symbol of his lady-love’s troth. “O his love gave him a gay gold ring, With a hey lillelu, and a how lo lan; With three shining diamonds set therein, And the birk and the broom blooms bonnie. “As long as these diamonds keep their hue, With a hey lillelu, and a how lo lan, Ye’ll know that I’m a lover true, And the birk and the broom blooms bonnie. “But when your ring turns pale and wan, With a hey lillelu, and a how lo lan, Then I’m in love with another man, And the birk and the broom blooms bonnie.”[740] Seven years went by, and then the ring-gems grew “pale and wan.” Hynd Horn hastened back, entered the wedding-hall disguised as a beggar, sent the covenant-ring to the bride in a glass of wine; and the sequel was the same as in The Noble Moringer. At a Brahman wedding, in India, described by Miss H. G. Brittan (in “The Missionary Link,” for October, 1864; cited in _Women of the Orient_, pp. 176-179) a silver dish, filled with water, (probably with water colored with saffron, or with turmeric, according to the common custom in India,) “also containing a very handsome ruby ring, and a thin iron bracelet,” was set before the father of the bride, during the marriage ceremony. At the covenanting of the young couple, “the ring was given to the groom; the bracelet to the bride; then some of the [blood-colored?] water was sprinkled on them (See page 194, _supra_), and some flowers [were] thrown at them.” Here seem to be combined, the symbolisms of the ring, the bracelet, and the blood, in a sacred covenanting. HINTS OF BLOOD-UNION.