'First let pass the black, Janet, And syne let pass the brown; But grip ye to the milk-white steed, And pu' the rider down.' Compare the first two of these stanzas with the queries put by the gay gos-hawk to his master: 'But how shall I your true love find, Or how suld I her know? I bear a tongue ne'er wi' her spoke, An eye that ne'er her saw.' 'O weel sall ye my true love ken, Sae sore as ye her see,' &c. As to the latter three stanzas, they exhibit a formula of description, which appears in several of the suspected ballads, consisting of a series of nearly identical statements, apparently for the sake of amplitude. For example, the progress of the seeming funeral of the lady in the _Gay Gos-hawk_: At the first kirk of fair Scotland, They gart the bells be rung; At the second kirk of fair Scotland, They gart the mass be sung. At the third kirk of fair Scotland, They dealt gold for her sake; And the fourth kirk of fair Scotland, Her true love met them at. Or the following, in _Sweet Willie and Fair Annie_, which is almost the same incident and relation of circumstances as the said seeming funeral; only the lady in this case is dead: The firsten bower that he cam till, There was right dowie wark; Her mother and her sisters three Were making to Annie a sark. The next bower that he cam till, There was right dowie cheer; Her father and her seven brethren Were making to Annie a bier. The lasten bower that he cam till, O heavy was his care; The waxen lights were burning bright, And fair Annie streekit there. In Scott's version of _Tam Lane_ there are some stanzas of so modern a cast as to prove that this poem has been at least tampered with. For example, the account of fairy life: 'And all our wants are well supplied From every rich man's store, Who thankless sins the gifts he gets, And vainly grasps for more.' Without regard, however, to such manifest patches, the general structure and style of expression must be admitted to strongly recall the other ballads which have been already commented on. Only a wish to keep this dissertation within moderate bounds forbids me to analyse a few other ballads, as the _Douglas Tragedy_, _Sweet Willie and Fair Annie_, _Lady Maiery_, the _Clerk's Two Sons of Owsenford_, and a Scotch _Heir of Linne_ lately recovered by Mr J. H. Dixon, all of which, besides others which must rest unnamed, bear traces of the same authorship with the ballads already brought under notice.