'Clerk Saunders' was first given to the world in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, II, 33, 1802, and was there said to be "taken from Mr Herd's MS., with several corrections from a shorter and more imperfect copy in the same volume, and one or two conjectural emendations in the arrangement of the stanzas." Sir Walter arranged his ballad with much good taste, but this account of his dealing with Herd's copies is very far from precisely accurate. #A#, the longer of these, does not end, as here printed, with Margret's refusal to be comforted, a rather unsufficing conclusion it must be owned. The story is continued by annexing the ballad of 'Sweet William's Ghost,' the lack of which in #B# makes Scott call that version imperfect. This sequel, found also in #F#, is omitted here, and will be given in the proper place.[101] Jamieson's, #F#, as well as Scott's, is a made-up copy, "the stanzas where the seven brothers are introduced" having been "enlarged from two fragments, which, although very defective in themselves, furnished lines which, when incorporated with the text, seemed to improve it." About one half of #G# is taken from Herd's MSS, with trivial alterations. The ghostly visitation at the end blends 'Proud Lady Margaret' with 'Sweet William's Ghost,' and this conclusion, not being worth transferring, has been allowed to stand.[102] The dream in #E# 13 may be derived from 'Fair Margaret and Sweet William.' The austerities vowed in #D# 13-15, #E# 17-20, found also in #A# 20-22, #G# 23-25, make a very satisfactory termination to the tragedy, and supply a want that may be felt in #B#, and in #A# as it stands here. The like are found in 'The Clerk's Twa Sons o Owsenford,' 'Bonny Bee Ho'm,' 'Lord Livingston,' 'The Weary Coble o Cargill,' and 'The Lowlands of Holland.' Also in the French ballad of 'La Biche Blanche,' where a brother, having unwittingly been the death of his sister, who was maid by day but hind by night, vows himself to a seven years' penance: J'en suis au désespoir, j'en ferai pénitence; Serai pendant sept ans sans mettr' chemise blanche, Et coucherai sept ans sous une épine blanche. or, Et j'aurai sous l'épin', pour toit, rien qu'une branche. Vaugeois, Histoire des Antiquités de la Ville de l'Aigle, p. 585, repeated in Bosquet, La Normandie Romanesque, p. 83, Beaurepaire, Poésie p. en Normandie, p. 78; Haupt, Französische Volkslieder, p. 20, Souvestre, in Revue des Deux Mondes, 1849, Avril, p. 106, and Les Derniers Paysans, p. 36, ed. 1871. The king, in 'Kong Valdemar og hans Søster,' Grundtvig, No 126, #A#, #B#, #C#, will live in a dark house where he shall never see fire nor light, nor shall the sun ever shine on him, till he has expiated his monstrous cruelty to his sister. So the marquis, in the Romance del Marques de Mántua, swears, till he has avenged the death of Valdovinos, de nunca peinar mis canas, ni las mis barbas cortar, de no vestir otras ropas, ni renovar mi calzar, etc.