This incident, the strange, often magically caused oblivion of the lover, whose love returns to him, like Sophia, at, or after, his marriage, is found in popular tales of Scotland, Norway, Iceland, Germany, Italy, Greece, and the Gaelic Western Islands. It does not occur in 'Lord Bateman,' where Mr. Thackeray suggests probable reasons for Lord Bateman's fickleness. But the world-wide incidents are found in older versions of 'Lord Bateman,' from which they have been expelled by the English genius for the commonplace.
Thus, if we ask, how did Sophia at first know of Bateman's existence? The lovely and delicate daughter of the Turk, doubtless, was unaware that, in the crowded dungeons of her sire, one captive of wealth, noble birth, and personal fascination, was languishing.
The Annotator explains: 'She hears from an aged and garrulous attendant, her only female adviser (for her mother died while she was yet an infant), of the sorrows and sufferings of the Christian captive.' In ancient versions of the ballad another explanation occurs. She overhears a song which he sings about his unlucky condition. This account is in Young Bekie (Scottish: mark the name, Bekie), where France is the scene and the king's daughter is the lady. The same formula of the song sung by the prisoner is usual. Not uncommon, too, is a TOKEN carried by Sophia when she pursues her lost adorer, to insure her recognition. It is half of her broken ring. Once more, why does Sophia leave home to find Bateman in the very nick of time? Thackeray's version does not tell us; but Scottish versions do. 'She longed fu' sair her love to see.' Elsewhere a supernatural being, 'The Billy Blin,' or a fairy, clad in green, gives her warning. The fickleness of the hero is caused, sometimes, by constraint, another noble 'has his marriage,' as his feudal superior, and makes him marry, but only in form.
There is a marriage in yonder hall, Has lasted thirty days and three, The bridegroom winna bed the bride, For the sake o' one that's owre the sea.
In this Scottish version, by the way, occurs--
Up spoke the young bride's mother, Who never was heard to speak so free, wrongly attributed to Mr. Thackeray's own pen.
The incident of the magical oblivion which comes over the bridegroom occurs in Scandinavian versions of 'Lord Bateman' from manuscripts of the sixteenth century.* Finally, the religious difficulty in several Scottish versions is got over by the conversion and baptism of Sophia, who had professed the creed of Islam. That all these problems in 'Lord Bateman' are left unsolved is, then, the result of decay. The modern vulgar English version of the pot-house minstrel (known as 'The Tripe Skewer,' according to the author of the Introduction to Cruikshank's version) has forgotten, has been heedless of, and has dropped the ancient universal elements of folk- tale and folk-song.
*Child, ii. 459-461.
These graces, it is true, are not too conspicuous even in the oldest and best versions of 'Lord Bateman.' Choosing at random, however, we find a Scots version open thus:
In the lands where Lord Beichan was born, Among the stately steps o' stane, He wore the goud at his left shoulder, But to the Holy Land he's gane.
That is not in the tone of the ditty sung by the Tripe Skewer.
Again, in his prison, He made na his moan to a stock, He made na it to a stone, But it was to the Queen of Heaven That he made his moan.
The lines are from a version of the North of Scotland, and, on the face of it, are older than the extirpation of the Catholic faith in the loyal North. The reference to Holy Land preserves a touch of the crusading age. In short, poor as they may be, the Scottish versions are those of a people not yet wholly vulgarised, not yet lost to romance. The singers have 'half remembered and half forgot' the legend of Gilbert Becket (Bekie, Beichan), the father of St.
Thomas of Canterbury. Gilbert, in the legend, went to Holy Land, was cast into a Saracen's prison, and won his daughter's heart. He escaped, but the lady followed him, like Sophia, and, like Sophia, found and wedded him; Gilbert's servant, Richard, playing the part of the proud young porter. Yet, as Professor Child justly observes, the ballad 'is not derived from the legend,' though the legend as to Gilbert Becket exists in a manuscript of about 1300. The Bateman motive is older than Gilbert Becket, and has been attached to later versions of the adventures of that hero. Gilbert Becket about 1300 was credited with a floating, popular tale of the Bateman sort, and out of his legend, thus altered, the existing ballads drew their 'Bekie' and 'Beichan,' from the name of Becket.