"Burdallane." The Sir Richard of 1575 has also one son left (John, the
minister of James VI.). {41a}

From this evidence, in 1802 in MS. unpublished, and from other Maitland
MSS., we learn that, in the sixteenth century, the Auld Maitland of the
ballad was an eminent character in the legends of that period, and in
the ballads of the people. {42b} His


Nobill sonnis three,
Ar sung in monie far countrie,
ALBEIT IN RURAL RHYME.


Pinkerton published, in 1786, none of the pieces to which Scott refers
in his extracts from the Maitland MSS. How, then, did Hogg, if Hogg
forged the ballad, know of Maitland and his "three noble sons"? Except
Colonel Elliot, to whose explanation we return, I am not aware that any
critic has tried to answer this question.

It seems to me that if the Ballad of Otterburne, extant in 1550 in
England, survived in Scottish memory till Herd's fragment appeared in
1776, a tradition of Maitland, who was popular in the ballads of 1575,
and known to Gawain Douglas seventy years earlier, may also have
persisted. There is no impossibility.

Looking next at Scott's Auld Maitland the story is that King Edward I.
reigned for fifty years. He had a nephew Edward (an apocryphal person:
such figures are common in ballads), who wished to take part in the
invasion of Scotland. The English are repulsed by old Maitland from