The two late texts--MSS. Maitland and Reidpeth--represent a Lowland Scots version of the poem, and are obviously copies of the same original. Probably the Reidpeth text is a transcription of the Maitland, but it contains some obvious misreadings of it, as in verse 3, line 3, _bowris_ (Maitl.), _towris_ (Reidpeth) repeating the rime-word; 5, l. 20, _within_ (Maitl.), _with_ (Reidpeth). The Maitland MS., compiled c. 1555-1585, adds the colophon _quod Marsar_. The later Reidpeth MS., 1622-1623, concludes with the words _quod Dumbar_. Mersar, or Marsar, is mentioned in Dunbar’s _Lament for the Makaris_, and is usually identified with a William Mersar of the household of James IV, mentioned 1500 to 1503. In any case, if he were a contemporary of Dunbar, he could scarcely be assigned to a sufficiently early date to account for the widespread popularity of _Erthe upon Erthe_ all over England in 1450, and the fact that the two MSS. assign the poem to different authors, of whom Dunbar is manifestly impossible, and Mersar at least improbable, may be explained as an instance of that readiness of posterity to attach a known name to a work of unknown origin, of which other examples are not wanting. It is, however, of interest to find that the poem had made its way to Scotland by 1550 or thereabouts. As regards dialect, the majority of the MSS. of the B version show traces of Northern dialect, most of them preserving the Nth. plural in _-is_ in the rimes _touris_, _schowrys_, &c. In verse 3 also the majority of the texts have the Nth. _bigged_ or _biggid_, but six (MSS. Billyng, Egerton, Rawl. P., Porkington, Balliol, and the Stratford text) use the Midl. or Sth. _bilded_ or _billed_. In verse 4 the rime requires the form _wold_ rather than the common Nth. _wald_, and even the Maitland MS. retains _wold_ for the sake of the rime, whereas MS. Reidpeth substitutes _wald_, sacrificing the rime. MSS. Thornton and Rawl. C. show distinct Nth. features, such as the verb-endings _-is_ (pres. ind. 3 sg.), _-and_ (pres. part.), _-id_, _-it_, _-in_ (past part.), and MS. Rawl. C. has the Nth. _whate gates at þu gase_ riming with _fase_ (_foes_). But few of the MSS. represent pure dialect-forms, and an investigation of the dialect of the texts is of little assistance towards determining that of the original poem. Such evidence as exists points, on the whole, to the North Midland district, and a widespread popularity in the North, which led to the later knowledge of the poem across the Border, but the popularity was evidently not confined to the North, and Southern as well as Northern forms may be traced in both early and late transcripts. THE CAMBRIDGE TEXT.