The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
Volume IX. From Steele and Addison to Pope and Swift.
XIV. Scottish Popular Poetry before Burns.
§ 18. Mrs. Cockburn; Jane and Sir Gilbert Elliot.
| Mrs. Cockburn, a relative of Sir Walter Scott, wrote, besides other songs which have not attained to popularity, a version of The Flowers of the Forest (“I have seen the Smiling”), which appeared in The Lark in 1765, and was, as she herself states, sung “at wells” 2 to the old tune. A more vernacular version, “I’ve heard them Lilting at the Ewe Milking”—which includes the first line and the burden of the old song now lost—by Jane Elliot, third daughter of Sir Gilbert Elliot, of Minto, was used by Herd for a version made up from various copies of the old ballad collated; but an authentic copy was obtained by Scott for The Border Minstrelsy. Miss Elliot’s brother, Sir Gilbert Elliot, was the author of My Apron Dearie in Johnson’s Museum. |
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