SONG XVI.

THE LASS OF COCKERTON.

Tune, Low down in the Broom.

"TWAS on a summer's evening,

As I a roving went,

I met a maiden fresh and fair,

That was a milking sent.

Whose lovely look such sweetness spoke, Divinely fair she shone;

With modest face her dwelling-place,

I found was Cockerton.

With raptures fir'd, I eager gaz'd,
On this blooming country maid,
My roving eye, in quickest search,
Each graceful charm survey'd.
The more I gaz'd, a new wonder rais'd,
And still I thought upon

Those lovely charms, that so alarms

In the Lass of Cockerton.

Now would the Gods but deign to hear

An artless lover's prayer;

This lovely nymph I'd ask,

And scorn each other care. True happiness I'd then possess, Her love to share alone;

No mortals know what pleasures flow, With the Lass of Cockerton.

SONG XIII.

1

ROOKHOPE-RYDE,*

A Bishoprick border-song, composed in 1569; taken down from the chanting of George Collingwood the elder, late of Boltsburn, in the neighbourhood of Ryhope, who was intered at Stanhope the 16th De cember 1785; never before printed.

ROOKHOPE stands in a pleasant place,
If the false thieves wad let it be
But away they steal our goods apace
And ever an ill death may they die! +

*Rookhope is the name of a valley about five miles in length, at the termination of which Rookhope-burn emp. ties itself into the river Wear, and is in the north part of the parish of Stanhope in Weardale. Rookhope-head is the top of the vale. Ryde is an inroad, or, as the Scots call it, a raid.

So, in a ballad of "Northumberland betrayed by Douglas," printed in Percy's Reliques, i. 233:

"And ever an ill death may they dye."

And so is the man of Thirlwa' 'nd Willie-haver,

And all their companies thereabout,

That is minded to do mischief,

But yet we will not slander them all,
For there is of them good enough;
It is a sore consumed tree

That on it bears not one fresh bough.

*Thirlwall or Thirlitwall is sayed by Fordun, the Scotish historian, to be a name given to the Picts or Roman wall, from its haveing been thirled, or perforated, in ancient times, by the Scots and Picts. Wyntown, also, who, most probablely, copyed Fordun, calls it Thirlwall. Thirlwall-castle, though in a very ruinous condition, is stil standing by the site of this famous wall, upon the river Tippal. It gave name to the ancient family de Thirlwall. Willie-haver, or Willeva, is a small district or township in the parish of Lanercost, near Bewcastle-dale in Cumberland; mentioned in the old border.ballad of Hobie Noble:

"Gar war the bows of Hartlie-burn

See they sharp their arrows on the wa':

Warn Willeva, and spear Edom

And see the morn they meet me a'."

Lord God! is not this a pitiful case,

That men dare not drive their goods to t' fell, But limmer thieves drives them away,

That fears neither heaven nor hell.

Lord, send us peace into the realm,
That every man may live on his own!
I trust to God, if it be his will,

That Weardale-men may never be overthrown,

For great troubles they've had in hand

With borderers pricking hither and thither,

But the greatest fray that e'er they had

Was with the men' of Thirlwa' 'nd Willie

haver.

They gather'd together so royally,

The stoutest men and the best in gear;

And he that rade not on a horse,

I wat he rade on a weil-fed mear.

So in the morning before they came out,
So well I wot they broke their fast,
In the [forenoon they came] unto a bye fell,
Where some of them did eat their last.*

*This would be about eleven o'clock, the usual dinner hour in that period.