Bluegrass Messengers

272. The Suffolk Miracle

No. 272: The Suffolk Miracle

CONTENTS:

1. Child's Narrative
2. Footnotes (The footnotes are found at the end of Child's Narrative)
3. Brief (Kittredge)
4. Child's Ballad Texts A (Changes for A b are found in End-Notes)
5. End-Notes
6. Additions and Corrections

ATTACHED PAGES (see left hand column):

1. Recordings & Info: 272. The Suffolk Miracle
A. Roud No. 246: The Suffolk Miracle (73 Listings)

2. Sheet Music: 272. The Suffolk Miracle (Bronson's music examples and texts)

3. US and Canadian Versions:

4. English and Other Versions (Including Child versions A a- A b)

Child's Narrative: 272. The Suffolk Miracle

A. 'The Suffolk Miracle.'
a. Wood, E. 25, fol. 83.
b. Roxburghe, II, 240; Moore's Pictorial Book of Ancient Ballad Poetry, p. 463.

Also Pepys, III, 332, No 328; Crawford, No 1363; Old Ballads, 1723, I, 266.

A young man loved a farmer's daughter, and his love was returned. The girl's father sent her to his brother's, forty miles off, to stay till she should change her mind. The man died. A month after, he appeared at the uncle's at midnight, and, as he came on her father's horse and brought with him her mother's travelling gear, he was allowed to take the girl away with him. As they rode, he complained of headache, and the girl bound her handkerchief about his head; he was cold as clay. In two hours they were at her father's door. The man went to put up the horse, as he said, but no more was seen of him. The girl knocked, and her father came down, much astonished to see her, and still more astonished when she asked if her lover, known by the father to be dead, had not been sent to bring her. The father went to the stable, where the girl said the man would be; there was nobody there, but the horse was found to be 'all on a sweat.' After conferences, the grave was opened, and the kerchief was found about the head of the mouldering body. This was told to the girl, and she died shortly after. This piece could not be admitted here on its own merits. At the first look, it would be classed with the vulgar prodigies printed for hawkers to sell and for Mopsa and Dorcas to buy. It is not even a good specimen of its kind. Ghosts should have a fair reason for walking, and a quite particular reason for riding. In popular fictions, the motive for their leaving the grave is to ask back plighted troth, to be relieved from the inconveniences caused by the excessive grief of the living, to put a stop to the abuse of children by stepmothers, to repair an injustice done in the flesh, to fulfil a promise; at the least, to announce the visitant's death. One would not be captious with the restlessness of defeated love, but what object is there in this young man's rising from the grave to take his love from her uncle's to her father's house? And what sense is there in his headache?

I have printed this ballad because, in a blurred, enfeebled, and disfigured shape, it is the representative in England of one of the most remarkable tales and one of the most impressive and beautiful ballads of the European continent. The relationship is put beyond doubt by the existence of a story in Cornwall which comes much nearer to the Continental tale.^[1]

Long, long ago, Frank, a farmer's son, was in love with Nancy, a very attractive girl, who lived in the condition of a superior servant in his mother's house. Frank's parents opposed their matching, and sent the girl home to her mother; but the young pair continued to meet, and they bound themselves to each other for life or for death. To part them effectually, Frank was shipped for an India voyage. He could not write, and nothing was heard of him for nearly three years. On All-hallows-Eve Nancy went out with two companions to sow hemp-seed. Nancy began the rite, saying:

Hemp-seed, I sow thee,
Hemp-seed, grow thee!
And he who will my true-love be
Come after me
And shaw thee.

This she said three times, and then, looking back over her left shoulder, she saw Frank indeed, but he looked so angry that she shrieked, and so broke the spell. One night in November a ship was wrecked on the coast, and Frank was cast ashore, with just enough life in him to ask that he might be married to Nancy before he died, a wish which was not to be fulfilled. On the night of his funeral, as Nancy was about to lock the house-door, a horseman rode up. His face was deadly pale, but Nancy knew him to be her lover. He told her that he had just arrived home, and had come to fetch her and make her his bride. Nancy was easily induced to spring on the horse behind him. When she clasped Frank's waist, her arm became stiff as ice. The horse went at a furious pace; the moon came out in full splendor. Nancy saw that the rider was in grave-clothes. She had lost the power of speech, but, passing a blacksmith's shop, where the smith was still at work, she recovered voice and cried, Save me! with all her might. The smith ran out with a hot iron in his hand, and, as the horse was rushing by, caught the girl's dress and pulled her to the ground. But the rider held on to the gown, and both Nancy and the smith were dragged on till they came near the churchyard. There the horse stopped for a moment, and the smith seized his chance to burn away the gown with his iron and free the girl. The horseman passed over the wall of the churchyard, and vanished at the grave in which the young man had been laid a few hours before. A piece of Nancy's dress was found on the grave. Nancy died before morning. It was said that one or two of the sailors who survived the wreck testified that Frank, on Halloween, was like one mad, and, after great excitement, lay for hours as if dead, and that when he came to himself he declared that if he ever married the woman who had cast the spell, he would make her suffer for drawing his soul out of his body.^[2]

A tale of a dead man coming on horseback to his inconsolable love, and carrying her to his grave, is widely spread among the Slavic people (with whom it seems to have originated) and the Austrian Germans, was well known a century ago among the northern Germans, and has lately been recovered in the Netherlands, Denmark, Iceland, and Brittany. Besides the tale in its integrity, certain verses which occur in it, and which are of a kind sure to impress the memory, are very frequent, and these give evidence of a very extensive distribution. The verses are to this effect:

The moon shines bright in the lift,
The dead, they ride so swift,
Love, art thou not afraid?

to which the lovelorn maid answers,

How fear, when I am with thee?^[3]

There are also ballads with the same story, one in German, several in Slavic, but these have not so original a stamp as the tale, and have perhaps sprung from it.

The following will serve as specimens of the tale in question; many more may certainly be recovered:

Great Russian. 1-5, Sozonovič, Appendix, Nos 1, 2, 7, 8, 9.^[4] Little Russian. 6-8, Trudy, II, 411, 413, 414, Nos 119-21; 9, Dragomanof, p. 392; 10-15, Sozonovič, Appendix, Nos 4-6, 10-12; 16, Bugiel, in the Slavic Archiv, XIV, 146. White Russian. 17, 18, Sozonovič, Appendix, No 3; Dobrovolśkij, Ethnographical Collection from Smolensk, p. 126, No 58. Servian. 19, Krauss, in Wisła, IV, 667. Croat. 20, 21, Strohal, pp. 114, 115, Nos 20, 21. Croat-Slovenian. 22-24, Valjavec, Narodne Pripovjedke, p. 239; Plohl-Herdvigov, I, 127, 129. Slovenian. 25, 26, Krek, in the Slavic Archiv, X, 357, 358. Polish. 27, Zamarski, p. 121; 28, Grudziński, p. 15; 29, Lach-Szyrma, Pamiętnik Naukowy, 1819, I, 358; 30, Kolberg, Lud, XIV, 181; 31, Treichel, in Zeitschrift für Volkskunde, II, 144; 32, Cheichowski, II, 40-42, No 59; 33, Siarkowski, in Zbiór wiadomości do antropologii krajowéj, III, III (21). Bohemian. 34, Sumlork, I, 608; 35, Erben, Kytice z básní, p. 23 (ballad founded on tale). Slovak. 36, Dobśinsky, pp. 23-30 (three versions). Wendish. 37, Schulenburg, Wendische Volkssagen, p. 137 (fragment). Lithuanian. 38, Leskien u. Brugman, p. 160, No 2, p. 497, No 43. Magyar. 39, Pap, Palóc Népköltemények, p. 94, also Arany and Gyulai, I, 207, No 52, and 569, Aigner, in Gegenwart, 1875, No 12. Gypsy. 40, Wlisłocki, Volksdichtungen der siebenbürgischen u. südungarischen Zigeuner, p. 283, No 43. German, High and Low. 41, Sztodola, in Herrmann, Ethnologische Mittheilungen aus Ungarn. col. 341 f. (Ofen); 42-45, Vernaleken, Mythen u. Bräuche des Volkes in Oesterreich, pp. 76 f., 79 f., Nos 6-9 (Lower Austria); 46-48, A. Baumgarten, Aus der volksmässigen Ueberlieferung der Heimat (Geburt, Heirat, Tod), pp. 135, 136, 136 f. (Upper Austria); 49, Boeckel, in Germania, XXXI, 117 (Baden); 50, 51, Jahn, Volkssagen aus Pommern u. Rügen, pp. 404, 406, No 515, i, n; 52, J. F. Cordes, in The Monthly Magazine, 1799, VIII, 602 f. (Glandorf, Lower Saxony); 53, Müllenhof, Sagen, etc., p. 164, No 224 (Ditmarsch). Netherlandish. 54-56, Pol de Mont, in Volkskunde, II, 129-31. Danish. 57, Grundtvig, Danmarks g. Folkeviser, III, 873. Icelandic. 58, Árnason, Íslenzkar Þjóðsögur, I, 280 ff.; Maurer, Isländische Volkssagen, p. 73 f.

A lover, who has long been unheard of, but whose death has not been ascertained, roused from his last sleep by the grief of his mistress (which in some cases drives her to seek or accept the aid of a spell), comes to her by night on horseback and induces her to mount behind him. As they ride, he says several times to her, The moon shines bright, the dead ride swift, art not afraid? Believing him to be living, the maid protests that she feels no fear, but at last becomes alarmed. He takes her to his burial-place, and tries to drag her into his grave; she escapes, and takes refuge in a dead-house (or house where a dead man is lying). The lover pursues, and calls upon the dead man within the house to give her up, which in most cases, for fellowship, he prepares to do. At the critical moment a cock crows, and the maid is saved.

Some of the tales are brief and defective, some mixed with foreign matter. The predominant traits, with a few details and variations, may be briefly exhibited by a synoptical analysis.

A pair of lovers are plighted to belong to each other in life and death, 50, 51, 57; whichever dies first is to visit the other, 48; the man, at parting, promises to come back, alive or dead, 25, 26. The man dies in war, 1, 2, 10, 14, 15, 17, 20-22, 25-29, 31, 32, 36, 39, 42, 45-52; the maid, her lover not returning, grieves incessantly, 4, 6-13, 15-18, 28, 29, 32, 49, 53. (The return of the lover is enforced by a spell, recommended or conducted by an old woman, 22, 28, 36, 39, 41, 45, advised by a priest, 20, 21, worked by the maid, 33; a dead man's head, bones, carcass, boiled in a pot, 15-17, 20, 21, 22, 27, 39, a piece of the man's clothing, 28, a cat burned in a red-hot oven, 33.) The man comes on horseback, mostly at night; she mounts with him, 1-5, 8-12, 14-23, 25-32, 36-44, 46, 48-53, 56-58, taking with her a bundle of clothes, smocks, etc., 1, 6, 7, 9, 16, 17, 21, 23, 24, 26, 32, 35, 36, 38. (There are two horses, 45; they go off in coach or wagon, 6, 7, 13, 24, 33; stag for horse, 47; afoot, 35, 54.) As they go, the man says or sings once or more, The moon shines bright, the dead ride fast, art thou afraid? and she answers that with him she has no fear. The verses occur in some form in all copies but 2, 3, 9, 11, 13, 15, 29, 32, 33, 38, 40, 51, and are mostly well preserved. (It is a voice from the churchyard in 38.)

Arrived at a grave in a churchyard, the man bids the maid to go in, 2, 4-6, 8, 10-17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 32, 36, 39; she says, You first, 2, 4-6, 8, 11-17, 23, 24, 32, 36, 39; she will first throw him her things, and then come, 14; she throws in her bundle of things, 1, 5, 23, 24, 26, 32, 36; hands them to him one after another, 6, 7, 16, 17; tells him to take her by the hands, and reaches out to him the sleeves of her gown, 2, 12; gives him the end of a piece of linen or of a ball of thread to pull at, 16, 19; asks him to spread her kerchief in the grave to make the frozen ground softer, 27, all this to gain time. He tears her things in the grave, 9, 13, 24; he seizes her apron, clutches her clothes, to drag her in, 4, 8, 21, 22, 25, 43, 44, 47, 48 (in 4 she cuts the apron in two, in 8 tears her gown off, in 25, 43, 44, 48, her apron parts); she runs off, 19, 11, 13-17, 20-27, 29, 30, 35, 36, 38, 39, 41, 45, 46, 48, 50; she throws down articles of dress to delay his pursuit, he tears them, 9, 13, 18, 38.

The maid takes refuge in a dead-house (or house in which there is a dead body, or two, or three), 1-4, 6, 8, 11-15, 17, 18, 20-22, 24-27, 29, 30, 32, 34-36, 38, 39, 41, 45, 46 (malt-kiln, 5, house of vampire, 16). She climbs on to the stove, or hides behind it, 6-8, 11, 13-16, 21, 24, 26, 32, 34, 36, 39, 41. The dead lover calls to the dead in the house to open, hand her out, 4, 6, 8, 11, 17, 20-22, 25, 26, 27, 29, 30, 32, 35, 36, 38, 39, 41, 45, 46, 48, 50, 57 (to seize the girl, 11; to tear her to pieces, 24); the dead man within is disposed to help his comrade, makes an effort so to do, 11, 29, 34, 41, 45, 46; opens the door, 6, 21, 36, 39; is prevented from helping because the maid has laid her cross, scapular, on his coffin, 4, 17; (two dead, because she has laid her rosary on the feet of one, her prayer-book on the feet of the other, 32;) the maid throws at him beads from her rosary, which check his movements until the string is exhausted; the maid puts up three effectual prayers, 35; Ave sounds, 48; by the maid's engaging his attention with a long tale, 38; because his wife or a watcher knocks him on the head, and orders him to lie where he is, 20, 30; because his wife has turned him over on his face, 57. In a few cases the dead man within inclines to protect the maid, 1, 22, 25; the two get into a fight, 1, 13-15, 17, 26, 36 (quarrel, 7). The cock crows, and the dead fall powerless, return to their places, turn to pitch, vanish, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 10, 11, 13-15, 17, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30, 32, 34-36, 39, 41, 45, 46, and the maid is saved.^[5]

In some of the tales of this section the maid is not so fortunate: in 6, the two dead take her by the legs and tear her asunder; in 21, the lover tears her, the dead man in the house having surrendered her. In 39, the lover, having been let in, says to the other dead man, Let us tear her to pieces, and is proceeding to do so, but is stopped by the cock. She dies of shock, or after a few days, 8, 11, 13, 16, 17, 29, 31, 32, 36.

The maid's escape assured, in one way or another, the man calls to her, Your good luck: I would have taught you to weep for the dead (he had been tearing her things in the grave, and her shift, which she had dropped to delay his pursuit), 9. Your body would have been rent into as many bits as your smocks (a bit was found on every grave in the church-yard), 22, 35. I would have torn you into a thousand tatters. I was all but saved, and have had to come so far! Then he warned her never again to long for the dead, 42. I would have taught you to disturb the dead, 41. It was her luck, for she would have been torn into a thousand bits, like her apron. Let this be a warning to you, says Our Lady to the girl, never to mourn so much again for the dead, for he had a hard journey to make, 43. He tore a portion of her gown into a thousand pieces, and laid one on every grave, saying, You were not so much a simpleton to mourn for me as I was not to tear you to pieces, 30. There was on every grave a bit of her gown, from which we may see how it would have fared with her, 31.

Resentment for the disturbance caused by the maid's excessive grief is expressed also in 6, Since you have wept so much for me, creep into my grave; in 12, she has troubled him by her perpetual weeping, he will take her where he dwells; in 20, Another time do not long for my dead body; in 27, You have mourned for me, now sleep with me; in 32, the maid's continual weeping is a burden to her lover in his grave. In 40, the remon- strance is affectionate and like (suspiciously like) that of Helgi and of Sir Aage (II, 235).

In some copies the story closes at the grave, 2, 10, 19, 23, 28, 40, 43, 44, 47, 49, 51, 52, 54, 56, 58; many of these, however, are brief and defective. The man lays himself in the grave, which closes, she flies, 23; he descends into the grave and tries to draw her in by her apron, the apron tears, she faints, and is found lying on the ground the next morning, 43; he descends into the grave and tries to draw her after him, she resists, the grave closes, and she remains without, 47; he disappears, she is left alone, 49, 52. She goes into the grave, remains there, and dies, 10; the grave opens, he pushes or drags her in, 54; both disappear in the grave, 56; the horse rushes three times round in a ring, and they are nowhere, 53; she is killed by the man, her flesh torn off, and her bones broken, 51.

The maid finds herself in a strange land, 44, 47; she is among people of different language, 26, 28, 29, 45; nobody knows of the place which she says she came from, 27; she is a long time in getting home, and nobody knows her then, 25; she is years in going home (from two to nine), 20, 22, 28, 46. The man and woman are a married pair in 2, 3, 23, 44, 45; in 44, the woman has married a second time, contrary to a mutual agreement. 10, 12, 16, 18, 19, have a taint of vampirism, and in 2 a stake is driven through the body of the man after he has returned to his grave, as was done with vampires.

In 31, the maid throws herself from the horse, the man, holding to her gown, tears off a large piece of it, and bits of the gown are found on every grave the next day; so in the Cornish tale, when the maid is pulled from the horse, the man retains a portion of her gown, and a piece is found on his grave. In 27, the maid's kerchief is found in the man's grave, and serves to corroborate her story; so in the Suffolk tale, with the handkerchief which the maid had bound round the man's head. 55, a brief and corrupted copy, compares very well with the Suffolk tale for pointlessness. The man comes on his father's horse, takes the girl on, and rides with her all round the village. Towards morning he brings the maid back to her chamber, and the horse to the stable, and goes where he came from.

Ballads. Little Russian. 1, 2, Golovatsky, I, 83, No 40; II, 708, No 12. Slovenian. 3, Valjavec, as before, preface, p. IV. Polish. 4, Grudziński, p. 25, 'Helene,' Galicia; 5, Max Waldau (G. v. Hauenschild) in Deutsches Museum, 1851, I, 136, No 5, Kreis Ratibor, Oberschlesien; 6, Mickiewicz, 'Ucieczka' (Works, Paris, 1880, I, 74), based on a ballad sung in Polish in Lithuania. Bohemian, Moravian. 7, Erben, 1864, p. 471; 8, Bartoš, 1882, p. 150; 9, 10, Sušil, p. 791, p. Ill, No 112. Gypsy. 11, Wlisłocki, as before, p. 104, South Hungary. German. 12, Schröer, Ein Ausflug nach Gottschee, Wiener Akademie, Sitzb. d. phil.-hist. Classe, LX, 235.^[6]

As I have already said, the ballads seem less original than the tales; that is, to have been made from tales, as 'The Suffolk Miracle' was. 5, 7, 10, are of the vulgar sort, like the English piece, 7 having perhaps received literary touches. In none of them does the maid fly and the man pursue; the catastrophe is at the grave.

The lovers have sworn mutual faith, 5, 10; the maid wishes that the man may come back, dead or living, 3, 10, 12; even from hell, 6.

The man has fallen in war, 1, 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12.

A spell is employed to bring him back, 1, 2, 6, 9.

He comes on a horse, 3, 4, 6-8, 11, 12; in a wagon, 5, 10; on foot, 1, 2, 9.

The verses found in the tales occur in 3 (three times), 4, 5, 6, 12; in 10, a voice from the clouds cries, What hast thou done, to be going off with a dead man?

She is taken to a graveyard. The grave closes over the man, she is left without, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12; both go into the grave, 4, 6, 7, 11.

She breathes out her soul on the grave, 3; she finds herself in the morning in a strange land, of different speech, is seven years in going home, 12.

1, 2, 9, are varieties of one ballad. The man asks the maid to go out with him to the dark wood, 1; to the cherry-tree (trees), 2, 9. After a time, he tells her to go back, he is no longer her lover, but a devil; she turns to dust, 1; the cock crows, he tells her to go home and not look round, to thank God for the cock, because he should have cut off her head, he is no longer her lover but a devil, 2. In 9, the man says his head aches badly, for, after mouldering six years, she had forced him to rise by her spell. The maid tells her mother that her lover is buried under the cherry-trees, mass is said for him; he returns to give thanks for his redemption from hell.^[7]

Reverting now to the English tales, we perceive that the Cornish is a very fairly well-preserved specimen of the extensive cycle which has been epitomized. Possibly the full moonshine is a relic of the weird verses which occur in so many copies. The hemp-seed rite is clearly a displacement and perversion of the spell resorted to in five Slavic and two German copies to compel the return of the dead man. It has no sense otherwise, for the maid did not need to know who was to be her lover; she was already bound to one for life and death. The ballad was made up from an imperfect and confused tradition. In pointlessness and irrationality it easily finds a parallel in the 55th tale, as already remarked. The hood and safeguard brought by the ghost represent the clothes which the girl takes with her in numerous copies. Remembering the 9th ballad, where the revenant complains of a headache, caused by the powerful enchantment which had been brought to bear on him, we may quite reasonably suppose that the headache in 'The Suffolk Miracle,' utterly absurd to all appearance, was in fact occasioned by a spell which has dropped away from the Suffolk story, but is retained in the Cornish.

M. Paul Sébillot has recently (in 1879) taken down, in that part of Brittany where French is exclusively spoken, a tale which is almost a repetition of the English ballad, and which for that reason has been kept by itself, 'Les Deux Fiancés,' Littérature orale de la Haute-Bretagne, p. 197. A young man and a maid have plighted themselves to marry and to be faithful to one another even after death. The young man, who is a sailor, goes on a voyage, and dies without her learning the fact. One night he leaves his tomb, and comes on a white mare, taken from her father's stable, to get the girl, who is living at a farm at some distance from her own home. The girl mounts behind him: as they go he says, The moon is bright, death is riding with you, are you not afraid? and she answers, I am not afraid, since you are with me. He complains of a headache; she ties her handkerchief round his head. They arrive at the girl's home; she gets down and knocks. To an inquiry, Who is there? she replies, Your daughter, whom you sent for by my husband that is to be. I have come on horseback with him, and lent him my handkerchief on the way, since he had none. He is now in the stable attending to the horse. They go to the stable and find the mare in a sweat, but no man. The girl then understands that her lover is dead, and she dies, too. They open the man's grave to bury the two together, and find the girl's handkerchief on his head. This is the English ballad over again, almost word for word, with the difference that the lover dies at sea, and that the substance of the notable verses is preserved.

In marked and pleasing contrast with most of the versions of the tale with which we have been dealing, in so many copies grotesque and ferocious, with a lover who, from impulses not always clear, from resentment sometimes that his comfort has been disturbed by her unrestrained grief, sometimes that she has been implicated in forcing him by magic to return to the world which he had done with, is bent on tearing his lass to pieces, is a dignified and tender ballad, in which the lovers are replaced by brother and sister. This ballad is found among the Servians, Bulgarians, Greeks, and Albanians, and is very common among the Greeks, both of the mainland and the islands.

Servian. Karadžić, II, 38, No 9, 'Yovan and Yelitza;' Talvj, Volkslieder der Serben, 1853, I, 295; Dozon, Chansons p. bulgares, p. 321; Bowring, Servian Popular Poetry, p. 45. Davidović, pp. 10-14, 'Yovo and Mara,' No 7; Krek, in Magazin f. d. Litt. d. In- u. Auslandes, p. 652, No 8.

Bulgarian. Dozon, Chansons p. bulgares, p. 130, No 7, p. 319. Kačanovskij, p. 120, No 48; Krek as above, p. 653 f., No 10, 'Lazar and Yovana.' Miladinof, 1861, 1891, p. 145, No 100, 'Lazar and Petkana; ' Krek, p. 653, No 9. Miladinof, p. 317, No 200, 'Elin Doika; ' Rosen, Bulgarische Volksdichtungen, p. 247, No 103. 'Elin Doina,' Popov, in Periodičesko Spisanie, II, 162, lacks the last half; Krek, p. 654, No 11. 'Yana,' Miladinof, p. 339, No 229, Rosen, p. 116, No 32, diverges considerably from the others.

Romaic. Twenty copies, including all previously published, Polites, in Δελτίον τῆς ἱστορικῆς καὶ ἐθνολογικῆς ἑταιρίας τῆς Ἑλλάδος, II, 193-261, 552-57, 1885-87. Kanellakes, Χιαχὰ Ἀνάλεκτα, p. 37, No 27, p. 58, No 49, 1890. Ζωγραφεῖος Ἀγών, I, 308, No 30, 397, No 17, 1891. 'Constantine and Arete' (mostly). C.B. Sheridan, The Songs of Greece, p. 207; C.C. Felton, in English and Scottish Ballads, Boston, 1860, I, 307; Lucy M.J. Garnett, Greek Folk-Songs, etc., 1885, p. 126.

Albanian. ('Garentina,' = Arete.) De Rada, Rapsodie, etc., p. 29 (I, xvii); Dozon, Ch. p. bulgares, p. 327, De Grazia, C. p. albanesi, p. 138. Camarda, Appendice al Saggio, etc., p. 98 (fragment, last half), p. 102. Dora d'Istria, Revue des Deux Mondes, LXIII, 407. La Calabria, II, 55, 1890. Tale, Metkos, Ἀλβανικὴ Μέλισσα, p. 189, No 12, translated in Dozon, Contes albanais, p. 251.^[8]

A mother has nine sons and an only daughter. The daughter is sought in marriage; the mother and eight of her sons wish to match her in their neighborhood, but the youngest son (whom it will be convenient to call Constantine) has his way, and she is given to a suitor from a distant country (often Babylon). The brothers are to visit their sister often (Slavic); Constantine promises to bring her to his mother should there be special occasion. A fatal year comes, and all the brothers die of the plague (in a few cases they are killed in war). The mother chants laments at the graves of the eight, strews flowers, burns candles, gives alms for their souls; at Constantine's grave she tears her hair. She curses Constantine for the distant marriage, and demands of him her daughter. God takes pity (on mother, sister, or son). The stone over his grave (his coffin, a board for the grave, his shroud, a cloud) is turned into a horse; he goes to his sister and informs her that she is wanted by her mother. The sister will put on gold for joy or black for grief; she is to come as she stands. (He tries to prevent her going, in the Servian copies, where his object is to pay the promised visit.) On the way the sister notes that Constantine is gray with mould, he smells of earth, his skin is black, his eyes are dull, his hair is dusty, his hair or teeth fallen out; why is this? He has been at work in the ground, has been building nine white houses, there has been dust, wind, and rain on the road, he has had long watches, sore sickness. He smells of incense, too; that is because he has been at church lately. Birds call out in human voice as they pass, What wonder is this, the living travelling with the dead! (Thrice in Romaic, 9, 10, and the Albanian tale, twice in Romaic 13.) The sister asks Constantine if he hears what the birds are saying; he hears, they are birds, let them talk. They near their mother's house; a church is hard by. Constantine bids his sister go on; he must say a prayer in the church, or pay a votive candle, find a ring which he lost there, see to his horse; he disappears. The house is locked, the windows shut, there is every sign of desolation and neglect. The daughter knocks; the mother, from within, cries, Avaunt, Death! I have no more children! The daughter cries, It is I.^[9] Who brought you? Constantine. Constantine is dead; (has been dead three days, forty days, five months, twelve years!) The mother opens, they die in a mutual embrace (the mo- ther dies, one dies within, one without).

'Le Frère de Lait,' Villemarqué, Barzaz Breiz, No 22, p. 163, ed. 1867, has no claim to be associated with these ballads, the only feature in which it has similarity not being genuine. Compare 'La Femme aux deux Maris,' Luzel, Gwerziou Breiz-Izel, I, 266-71, two versions, and II, 165-69, two more; and see Luzel, De l'authenticité des chants du Barzaz-Breiz, p. 39.

Footnotes:

1. Mr. W. E. A. Axon, in his Lancashire Gleanings, p. 261, speaks of the story of the Spectre Bridegroom as having been current in the neighborhood of Liverpool in the last century, both in an oral and a printed form. But it is plain that what was current, either way, was simply 'The Suffolk Miracle.' Of this I have a copy learned in the north of Ireland in 1850 (and very much changed as to form), in which the scene is laid "between Armagh and County Clare."

2. Popular Romances of the West of England, collected and edited by Robert Hunt, First Series, pp. 265-72, dating from about 1830.

3. A portion (or portions) of a Low German tale of this class, the verses and a little more, was the basis of Bürger's 'Lenore,' composed in 1773. (As to the particulars of the traditional basis, Erich Schmidt seems to me undoubtedly right: Charakteristiken, p. 219 f.) At the end of the last century, when 'Lenore' became well known in England through half a dozen translations, it was maintained that Bürger had taken the idea of his ballad from 'The Suffolk Miracle,' with which he was supposed to have become acquainted through the copy in Old Ballads, 1723. See The Monthly Magazine, 1796, II, 603. But it is nearly certain that Bürger had not seen, and never saw, the "Old Ballads" of 1723. In 1777 Boie made him acquainted with a book of that title, but this was in all probability Evans's first collection, which appeared in that year. See Strodtmann, Briefe von und an G.A. Bürger, II, 85, 87. Bürger knew 'Sweet William's Ghost' from Percy's Reliques, and took a hint or two from that, besides the lover's name.

4. I. Sozonovič, Bürger's 'Lenore,' and the related matter in European and Russian popular poetry, Warsaw, 1893 (in Russian). Professor Wollner has furnished me translations of some twenty-five pieces in Sozonovic. See, for German versions of many of the Slavic tales and ballads, Wollner, in Archiv für slavische Philologie, VI, 243-59; Krek, in the same, X, 357-59, and in Magazin für die Litteratur des In- u. Anslandes, 1887, CXII, 629-32, 650-54; Grudziński, Lenore in Polen, 1890, p. 13 ff.; Treichel, in Zeitschrift für Volkskunde, II, 144.

5. 30, 31, 32, 50, have curious popular traits. In 30, 32, the dead man (men) within being unable to render aid, the lover calls to yarn spun on Thursday (on Thursday after the evening meal) to open. A watchman tells the yarn to stay where it was hanged; the girl cuts the skein in two with an axe. In 31 there is no corpse in the house; the lover calls on a ball of thread and a broom, 'ohne Seele' (with no centre-piece, no handle) to open. In 50 the dead man within cannot help the man without because a broom is standing on its handle; so the man without calls on a skein of yarn, a pot-hook, a ball of thread, to open. For various reasons these appeals prove bootless.

6. For German versions of most of the Slavic pieces, Grudziński, as before, p. 27; Wollner, as before, pp. 250, 255 f., 258; Krek, as before, p. 652. 7 also in A. Waldau's Böhmische Granaten, II, 254, No 354.

'Lenore' in Wunderhorn, II, 19, 1808, is to be rejected as spurious, on internal and external evidence. See Pröhle, G.A. Bürger, Sein Leben und seine Dichtungen, 1856, p. 100 f.

7. In 11 we have to do with a married pair, as in several of the tales. In tale 44 the woman has been twice married, and her first husband comes for her.

8. No filiation is implied in the above arrangement of the ballads.

9. The mother demands tokens of her identity, Romaic 11, 12 21, 22, Albanian 4, 5. Cf. II, 215.

Brief Description by George Lyman Kittredge

This ballad is, in a blurred, enfeebled, and disfigured shape, the representative in England of one of the most remarkable tales and one of the most impressive and beautiful ballads of the European continent. The relationship is put beyond doubt by the existence of a story in Cornwall which comes much nearer to the Continental tale.

Hemp-seed, I sow thee,
Hemp-seed, grow thee!
And he who will my true-love be
Come after me
And shaw thee.

The moon shines bright in the lift,
The dead, they ride so swift,
Love, art thou not afraid?
to which the lovelorn maid answers,
How fear, when I am with thee?

A portion (or portions) of a Low German tale of this class, the verses and a little more, was the basis of Burger's 'Lenore,' composed in 1773. There are also ballads with the same story, one in German, several in Slavic, but these have not so original a stamp as the tale, and have perhaps sprung from it.

In marked and pleasing contrast with most of the versions of this tale, in so many copies grotesque and ferocious, is a dignified and tender ballad, in which the lovers are replaced by brother and sister. This ballad is found among the Servians, Bulgarians, Greeks, Albanians, and Roumanians. Professor Schischmanov (Indogermanische Forschungen, iv, 412-48, 1594) makes out a very strong probability of the derivation of all the ballads of 'The Dead Brother' from the Greek.

Child's Ballad Text

'The Suffolk Miracle'- Version A; Child 272 The Suffolk Miracle
a. Wood, E. 25, fol. 83.

1    A wonder stranger ne'r was known
Then what I now shall treat upon.
In Suffolk there did lately dwell
A farmer rich and known full well.

2    He had a daughter fair and bright,
On whom he plac'd his chief delight;
Her beauty was beyond compare,
She was both virtuous and fair.

3    A young man there was living by,
Who was so charm d with her eye
That he could never be at rest,
He was with love so much possest.

4    He made address to her, and she
Did grant him love immediately;
Which when her father came to hear,
He parted her and her poor dear.

5    Forty miles distant was she sent,
Unto his brother's, with intent
That she should there so long remain
Till she had chang'd her mind again.

6    Hereat this young man sadly grievd,
But knew not how to be relievd;
He sighd and sobd continually
That his true love he could not see.

7    She by no means could to him send
Who was her heart's espous d friend;
He sighd, she grievd, but all in vain,
For she confin'd must still remain.

8    He mournd so much that doctor's art
Could give no ease unto his heart;
Who was so strang[e]ly terrified,
That in short time for love he dyed.

9    She that from him was sent away
Knew nothing of his dying-day,
But constant still she did remain;
To love the dead was then in vain.

10    After he had in grave been laid
A month or more, unto this maid
He comes about middle of the night,
Who joyd to see her heart's delight.

11    Her father's horse, which well she knew,
Her mother's hood and safeguard too,
He brought with him to testifie
Her parents' order he came by.

12    Which when her unckle understood,
He hop't it would be for her good,
And gave consent to her straightway
That with him she should come away.

13    When she was got her love behind,
They passd as swift as any wind,
That in two hours, or little more,
He brought her to her father's door.

14    But as they did this great haste make,
He did complain his head did ake;
Her handkerchief she then took out,
And tyed the same his head about.

15    And unto him she thus did say:
'Thou art as cold as any clay;
When we come home, a fire wee'l have;'
But little dreamt he went to grave.

16    Soon were they at her father's door,
And after she ne'r see him more;
'I'le set the horse up,' then he said,
And there he left this harmless maid.

17    She knockt, and strait a man he cryed,
'Who's there?' ''Tis I,' she then replyed;
Who wondred much her voice to hear,
And was possest with dread and fear.

18    Her father he did tell, and then
He stared like an affrighted man:
Down stairs he ran, and when he see her,
Cry'd out, My child, how cam'st thou here?

19    'Pray, sir, did you not send for me,
By such a messenger?' said she:
Which made his hair stare on his head,
As knowing well that he was dead.

20    'Where is he?' then to her he said;
'He's in the stable,' quoth the maid.
'Go in,' said he, and go to bed;
I'le see the horse well littered.'

21    He stared about, and there could hee
No shape of any mankind see,
But found his horse all on a sweat;
Which made him in a deadly fret.

22    His daughter he said nothing to,
Nor no one else, though well they knew
That he was dead a month before,
For fear of grieveing her full sore.

23    Her father to his father went
Who was deceasd, with this intent,
To tell him what his daughter said;
So both came back unto this maid.

24    They askd her, and she still did say
'Twas he that then brought her away;
Which when they heard they were amaz'd,
And on each other strang[e]ly gaz'd.

25    A handkerchief she said she tyed
About his head, and that they tryed;
The sexton they did speak unto,
That he the grave would then undo.

26    Affrighted then they did behold
His body turning into mould,
And though he had a month been dead,
This kercheif was about his head.

27    This thing unto her then they told,
And the whole truth they did unfold;
She was thereat so terrified
And grievd, she quickly after dyed.

28    Part not true love, you rich men, then;
But, if they be right honest men
Your daughters love, give them their way,
For force oft breeds their lives' decay.

End-Notes

The Suffolk Miracle, or, A relation of a young man who a month after his death appeared to his sweetheart and carryed her behind him fourty miles in two hours time and was never seen after but in the grave.
To the tune of My bleeding heart, etc.
London: Printed for W. Thackery and T. Passenger. [1689. The date added by Wood.]
Roxburghe and Crawford: Printed by and for A. M[ilbourne], and sold by the booksellers of Pye-corner and London-bridge.
Pepys: Printed for F. C[oles], T. V[ere], J. W[right], J. C[lark], W. T[hackeray], T. P[assinger].
a. 14³, 25¹. handcherchief.
16⁴. he set (O. B. left).
17². whose.
22¹. too.
24⁴. others.
25⁴. undoe.

b. 3¹. There was a young man.
4¹. addresses.
4³. But when.
16⁴. he set.
19¹. did not you.
19³. hair stand.
27². did wanting.

Additions and Corrections

P. 60 ff. See Professor Schischmánov in Indogermanische Forschungen, IV, 412-48, 1894, Der Lenorenstoff in der bulgarischen Volkspoesie. Professor Schischmánov counts more than 140 versions of The Dead Brother, ballad and tale, in Albanian, Bulgarian, Greek, Roumanian, and Servian, 60 of these Bulgarian. Dozon 7 is affirmed to be a mere plagiarism. The versions of the Romaic ballad run up to 41. A very strong probability is made out of the derivation of all of the ballads of 'The Dead Brother' from the Greek.

62. Compare La Jeune Fille et l'âme de sa mere, Luzel, I, 60, 61 ff. A girl who grieves for her dead mother, and wishes to see her again, is directed by the curé to go three nights to the church, taking each time an apron for her mother. The mother tears the apron into 9, 6, 3 pieces successively.

La mère va alors trouver sa fille
Et lui parle de la sorte:
'Tu as eu du bonheur
Que je ne t'aie mise toi-meme en morceaux!
'Que je ne t'aie mise en pièces, toute vivante,
Comme je le faisais a mes tabliers!
'Tu augmentais mes peines, chaque jour,
Par la douleur que tu me témoignais!'

64. A dead lover takes his mistress on his horse at midnight and carries her to the grave in which he is to be buried the following day. Her corpse is found there, flattened out and disfigured. 'La fiancée du mort,' Le Braz, La Légende de la mort en Basse-Bretagne, pp. 359-67.

[65 a. Romaic. Add: Georgeakis et Pineau, Le Folk-lore de Lesbos, p. 253 (in translation).]