NOTES, 345 CHILD MAURICE. H.-F., Percy Folio, II, 500 ff.; ChUd, IV, 263 ff. A popular Scottbh version is Gill Morice ; see Gray's letter, above, p. 309. Upon this vivid and admirable ballad Home founded his tragedy of Douglas. — For the Silver Wood, see Jellon Gramcy i ; Child, IV, 303. 1 3. that is superfluous. 2. In the MS. this is preceded by a defective stanza : . . . And he tooke his silver combe in his hand, To kembe his yellow lockes. 4-5. The sense is that the page must greet the lady as many times as there are knots in nets for the hair, or merchant-men faring to London, or thoughts of the heart, or schoolmasters in all the school- houses ; in short :
- Griiss mir mein Liebchen zehntausend mal ! '
4 3. Sometimes * lovely London.* So * fair Edinburgh ' in Arm- strong, and * merry Lincoln * in Sir Hugh, 6-7. He sends her tokens of his identity. 7 4. Let (infinitive) = desist. 20 1. him : dative of subject with verbs of motion. 25 1. As in Gest, 305 l, and often in the ballads, swords are both
- brown* and 'bright,* and the former adjective probably means
- burnished,' or * glistening.* Cf. briin and bninecg (Biovmlf, vv.
2574, 1546) used in A.-S. of the sword, and evidently in the sense of
- bright,* not * dark * or * brown,* as Grein defined the words. If the
adjective has such venerable traditions, however, one is half inclined to follow it further back to those bronze swords, found so plentifully in Denmark, and elsewhere in reasonable abundance, and exquisite enough in their workmanship to have come from the hand of W^land himself. 26 1. hee = John Steward. 30-31. See (above, p. 339) conclusion of Little Musgrave and L^dy Barnard, Digitized by LjOOQIC
