#French.# Bujeaud, Chants et Chansons populaires des provinces de l'Ouest, #A#, I, 198, #B#, I, 200, 'J'entends le rossignolet.' #A#. This ballad has suffered injury at the beginning and the end, but still preserves very well the chief points of the story. A lover has promised his mistress that after returning from a long absence he would take her to see his country. While traversing a wood she is seized with her pains. The aid of her companion is declined: "Cela n'est point votre métier." She begs for water. The lover goes for some, and meets a lark, who tells him that he will find his love dead, with a child in her arms. Two stanzas follow which are to no purpose. #B#. The other copy of this ballad has a perverted instead of a meaningless conclusion, but this keeps some traits that are wanting in #A#. It is a two-line ballad, with the nightingale in the refrain: "J'entends le rossignolet." A fair maid, walking with her lover, falls ill, and lies down under a thorn. The lover asks if he shall go for her mother. "She would not come: she has a cruel heart." Shall I go for mine? "Go, like the swallow!" He comes back and finds his love dead, and says he will die with his mistress. The absurd conclusion follows that she was feigning death to test his love. The names in the Scandinavian ballads, it is remarked by Grundtvig, V, 242, 291, are not Norse, but probably of German derivation, and, if such, would indicate a like origin for the story. The man's name, for instance, in the Danish 'Sønnens Sorg,' #A#, Gysellannd, seems to point to Gisalbrand or Gisalbald, German names of the 8th or 9th century. There is some doubt whether this Gysellannd is not due to a corruption arising in the course of tradition (see Grundtvig, V, 302); but if the name may stand, it will account for our Leesome Brand almost as satisfactorily as Hildebrand does for Earl Brand in No 7.