as quoted, is already familiar in The Complaynte of Scotland (about
1549), and this line is not in the English ballad. So far it seems as
if the English balladist borrowed the scene from a Scots version, and
perverted it into a description of a fight, between Percy, who wins,
and Douglas--in place of the Scots version, the victory over Percy of
Sir Hugh Montgomery.

This transference of incidents in the English and Scottish ballads is a
phenomenon which we are to meet again in the ballad of Jamie Telfer of
the Fair Dodhead. One "maker" or the other has, in old times, pirated
and perverted the ballad of another "maker."



SCOTT'S TRADITIONAL COPY AND HOW HE EDITED IT



As early as December 1802-January 1803, Scott was "so anxious to have a
complete Scottish Otterburn that I will omit the ballad entirely in the
first volume (of 1803), hoping to recover it in time for insertion in
the third." {67a}

The letter is undated, but is determined by Scott's expressed interest
"about the Tushielaw lines, which, from what you mention, must be worth
recovering." In a letter (Abbotsford MSS.) from Hogg to Scott (marked
in copy, "January 7, 1803") Hogg encloses "the Tushielaw lines," which
were popular in Ettrick, but were verses of the eighteenth century.
They were orally repeated, but literary in origin.