"There was never ane o' my songs prentit till ye prentit them yourself, and ye hae spoilt them a'togither. They were made for singin' and no for readin', but ye hae broken the charm now, and they'll never be sung mair.""

If were teaching a course on these ballads, I would write that up on the board on the first day and spend the whole period talking about it. What does that mean?

Earl Bran has 3 lovely singing traditions in the Child TOME :-) Here let me blow some dust off.

7A is sung like this:
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Ay lally, O lilly lally
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All i the night sae early

7G is sung like this:
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Faldee faldee fal deediddle a dee
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And the brave knights in the valley

& in 7H it shifts a bit each time but is basically sung thus:
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Aye lally an lilly lally
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And the braw knights o Airly

I think that lilly lally thing is lovely. Lilly of the Valley is my favorite flower. I have a large patch of them. They will be up soon. Jim, did you know that lillies of the valley only release their scent directly into the air? You can't extract it like you do other flowers.

Child 7B, C, D, E, F & I are the Douglas Tragedy. They are texts that were turned into "ballads," not part of a singing tradition. The rose-brier motif was tacked on when the Douglas Tragedy was published along with the romantic legend that surrounds it (and the printer was paid I imagine). 75A, G & H don't have the motif because they don't need it. They have lilly lally :-)

The power of publishing to influence posterity is immense. It has been abused. Where is this copy of the Douglas Tragedy supplied by Sharpe? Does it exist? Even if it did, what could prove? That the printer was paid? That Blackhouse is a tourist attraction to this day because of Sir Walt? Excuse me while I don some gardening gloves and take a dive to the bottom of St. Mary's Loch. There's something down there that doesn't belong there...