No. 301: The Queen of Scotland
[There are no known US or Canadian traditional versions of this ballad.]
CONTENTS:
1. Child's Narrative
2. Footnotes (There are no footnotes for this ballad)
3. Brief (Kittredge)
4. Child's Ballad Text A
ATTACHED PAGES (see left hand column):
1. Recordings & Info: 301. The Queen of Scotland
A. Roud No. 3878: The Queen of Scotland (2 Listings)
2. Sheet Music: 301. The Queen of Scotland (Bronson gives no music )
3. English and Other Versions (Including Child version A)
Child's Narrative: 301. The Queen of Scotland
A. 'The Queen of Scotland,' Buchan's Ballads of the North of Scotland, I, 46; Motherwell's Manuscript, p. 577.
A queen in the king's absence invites young Troy Muir to her bower and bed; he declines, and the queen resolves to do him an ill turn. She tells him that if he will lift a stone in the garden he will find in a pit under the stone gold enough to buy him a dukedom. The next morning Troy Muir lifts the stone, and a long-starved serpent winds itself round his middle. A maid comes by and allays the serpent's rage by cutting off her pap for him. Troy Muir is immediately released and the wound in the maid's breast heals in an hour. Troy Muir marries the maid the same day; she bears him a son, and by heaven's grace recovers her pap thereupon.
The insipid ballad may have been rhymed from some insipid tale. Motherwell conjectured that Troy Muir stands for Triamour, but the story here has no sort of resemblance to the romance.
Brief Description by George Lyman Kittredge
On the resemblance of this ballad to the story of Caradoc and his love, see Miss C. A. Harper's article in Modern Language Notes, XIII, 417, and cf. G. Paris, Romania, xxvm, 214.
Child's Ballad Text
'The Queen of Scotland'- Version A; Child 301 The Queen of Scotland
'The Queen of Scotland,' Buchan's Ballads of the North of Scotland, I, 46; Motherwell's Manuscript, p. 577.
1 'O Troy Muir, my lily-flower,
An asking I'll ask thee;
Will ye come to my bigley bower
And drink the wine wi me?'
2 'My dame, this is too much honour
You have conferrd on me;
I'm sure it's mair than I've deservd
Frae sic a one as thee.'
3 'In Reekie's towers I hae a bower,
And pictures round it set;
There is a bed that is well made,
Where you and I shall sleep.'
4 'O God forbid,' this youth then said,
'That ever I drie sic blame
As ever to touch the queen's bodie,
Altho the king's frae hame.'
5 When that he had these words spoken,
She secretly did say,
Some evil I shall work this man,
Before that it be day.
6 Whan a' her maids were gane to bed,
And knights were gane frae hame,
She calld upon young Troy Muir,
To put fire in her room.
7 'An asking, asking, Troy Muir,
An asking ye'll grant me;'
'O, if it be a lawful thing,
My dame it's granted be.'
8 'There is a stane in yon garden,
Nae ane lifts it for me;
But if that ye woud lift the same,
A brave man I'll ca thee.
9 'Under yon stane there is a pit,
Most dreary for to see,
And in it there's as much red gowd
As buy a dukedom to thee.'
10 'O if I had ae sleep in bed,
And saw the morning sun,
As soon 's I rise and see the skies,
Your will it shall be done.'
11 When birds did sing, and sun did rise,
And sweetly sang the lark,
Troy Muir to the garden went,
To work this dreary wark.
12 He's taen the stane then by a ring,
And lifted manfullie;
A serpent that lang wanted meat
Round Troy Muir's middle did flee.
13 'How shall I get rid o this foul beast?
It's by it I must dee;
I never thought the queen, my friend,
Woud work this mischief to me.'
14 But by there came a weelfaird may,
As Troy Muir did tauk,
The serpent's furious rage to lay,
Cut aff her fair white pap.
15 As soon as she the same had done,
Young Troy Muir was set free,
And in ane hour the wound was heald,
That nae mair pain had she.
16 Says Troy Muir, My lily-flower,
Ye hae releas d me;
But before I see another day,
My wedded wife ye'se be.
17 He married her on that same day,
Brought her to his ain hame;
A lovely son to him she bare,
When full nine months were gane.
18 As heaven was pleasd, in a short time,
To ease her first sad pain,
Sae was it pleasd, when she'd a son,
To hae a pap again.