Okay, mg and Pip—

"OK. Here goes. I do not think you improved that song. You changed it entirely. You put her from alive to dead. If you want to do that, fine...but...."

Changed it entirely, mg? I don't think so.

I ran a Google search on "The Gypsy Laddie" and "Child 200" and hit a long list of web sites.

I found many versions of the ballad on one web site alone. The following are the final verses of several versions that end in a manner very similar to what my friend and I came up with at 2:00 in the morning in The Coffee Corral in Seattle's University District bask in the late 1950s.

200A.10
And we were fifteen well-made men,
Altho we were nae bonny;
And we were a' put down for ane,
A fair young wanton lady.

200B.18
They were fifteen valiant men,
Black, but very bonny,
And they lost all their lives for one,
The Earl of Cassillis' ladie.

200C.14
'We are sixteen clever men,
One woman was a' our mother;
We are a' to be hanged on ae day,
For the stealing of a wanton lady.'

200D.14
'Yestre'en we were fifteen good armed men;
Tho black, we werena bonny;
The night we a' ly slain for one,
It's the Laird o Corse Field's lady.'

200F.13
Then we were seven weel-made men,
But lack! we were nae bonnie,
And we were a' put down for ane,
For the Earl o Cassilis' ladie.

200G.11
There was seven gypsies in a gang,
And they was brisk and bonny,
And they're to be hanged all on a row,
For the Earl of Castle's lady.

It would seem that in some versions, the Lord heaves a sigh and simply goes home, leaving his lady with the gypsies. In some, he kills his lady, then either hangs the gypsies who vary in number from three to sixteen. In some, he may or may not kill anyone, but he drags his lady home, kicking and screaming, Or he kills everyone in an unspecified manner.

Here's another variation on the lady's fate:

Oh, soon this lady changed her mind,
Her clothes grew old and faded,
Her hose and shoes came off her feet,
And left them bare and naked.

Just what befell this lady now,
I think it worth relating,
Her gypsy found another lass,
And left her heart a-breaking.

But—let's cut to the chase here. Is this ballad based on a true incident? Yes, it would seem so. And what really happened?

The gypsies were expelled from Scotland in 1541 and then in again in 1609. In 1624 Johnny Faa (a title of prominent gypsies) and seven other men were sentenced to hang and Helen Faa and ten women were sentenced to be drown, but the women's execution was stayed.

Circa 1788 this ballad became associated with John, the sixth earl of Cassilis and his first wife, Lady Jean Hamilton. Before her marriage Lady Jean was in love with "Johnny Faa, of Dunbar". Years later, after she had borne two children, Johnny Faa returned and persuaded her to elope. Johnny Faa and seven other gypsies (which correlates to the 1624 sentence) were hanged and Lady Jean was banished and confined for life in a tower built for her imprisonment. Eight heads, effigies of the gypsies, were said to be carved in the stone tower.

As commentator Paul Harvey used to say, "And now—you know the rest of the story."

So Dr. Fowler was right in his belief that there were probably already existing versions that ended violently, because not only were there, but the incident that inspired the ballad in the first place ended violently. There was nothing in the change that Dick and I made that was not already within the tradition.

Before you get on someone's case for making an unwarranted change in a song or ballad, you might want to do a little research of your own. They might have known exactly what they were doing. Or, at least, had made a pretty good guess!

Don Firth