That gestours dos of him geftes,

At mangerés and at great festes,
Here dedis ben in remembraunce
In many fair romaunce."

The story itsfelf, if not actually printed, is suspected to have been wel known in Scotland above two hundred years ago: as, in Wedderburns Complainte, which appear'd at St. Andrews, in 1549, we find "the tayl quhou the kyng of Eftmureland mareit the kyngis · dochtir of Vestmureland." These feem the Eftnesse and Weftneffe of the present poem, and apparently fignify Engleland and Ireland. No country, at the fame time, in Britain, was ever call'd Eaftmoreland; and, from an old rime, citeëd by Ufher (P. 303), Weftmoreland receive'd that appellation from a fabulous king:

"Here the king Westmer

Slow the king Rothynger."

A "king Eftmere," likewife, is the subject of one of Percys ballads (1,62), whose native country appears to be Spain.

In a large and valuable manufcript, of the fourteenth century, in the library of the faculty of advocates, Edinburgh, number'd W. 4. 1. and being a present from the late lord Auchinleck, is an excellent, but, like allmost every other in the volume, imperfect,

of one Wade and his boate Guingelot, wherein he did many ftrange things and had many wonderfull adventures." He is fufpected to have been either a Scot or a Pict (or Pik, as mister Pinkerton wil have it), and to have been the chief or leader in an irruption through the Roman wall; in which was a chaẩm known, in old time, by the name of "Wades-gapp." See Wallises History of Northumberland, II, 3, n (e).

romance, very different from the prefent, of "Hornchilde & maiden Rimnild [not Rinivel]", in ftanzas, begining,

"My leve frende dere."

This curious fragment wil be found at the end of the present notes.

An imperfect copy of the original French romance, a performance of great merit, is preferve'd in the Harleian MS. Num. 527. It is, to all appearance, as old as the twelfth century, but, unfortunately, defective both at the begining and at the end. The poem is in couplets, of which every ten, twelve, or fifteen, terminate in the fame rime.

The Engleifh romance, here giveën, which contains no more than 1546 lines, is rather an abridgement than a translation of the French copy, the fragment of which confifts of no less than 2760. Most of the names, allfo, are entirely different; nor can the identity of the two poems be easeyly ascertain❜d, so that, it is possible, there may have been another French romance on this fubject; fince it would be very fingular to find a translatour indulgeing himself in such excesfive libertys. Doctor Percy, therefor, had very little reason to asfert that "the old metrical romance of Horn-child appears of genuine English growth;" and this after the judicious Tyrwhitt had giveën his decisive opinion, "that we have no English romance, prior to the age of Chaucer, which is not a translation or imitation of fome earlier French romance" (IV, 68). Any peculiar inftanceës of "Anglo-Saxon language or idiom," which should induce him to imagine that it "" can scarce be dated later than within a century after the conqueft" (I, lxxviii), wil be rather difficult to

discover; fince, in fact, it favours much more of the Norman idiom than the Saxon.

. The title prefix'd in the original manuscript, "Her bygynnep be gefte of kyng Horn," though writen in a different ink from the poem itsfelf, is of the fame age and character, and, apparently, by the fame hand. It was, therefor, thought right to prefer it to "Horn child," which, however, appears to have been its popular name, unless Chaucer actually meant another romance on the fame fubject, which wil be mention'd elsewhere.

V. 5. Kynge he wes by wefte.]

This country, in other placeës call'd Sudene or Suddene, appears, from the French MS. (in which the latter name occurs) to be Bretaine.

V. 11. For reyn ne myhte by ryne

Ne fonne myhte fhyne.]

Mister Ellis ingeniously conjectures the meaning to be, "For rain might not rain upon, nor fun shine upon, fairer child than he was :" he conceives that by-ryne is be-rain, a prefix to verbs, which ftands in lieu of many prepofitions, as in be-dawb, to dawb all over, &c. It might be difficult, at the fame time, to find an inftance of by ryne for beraîn; so that we may conjecture the fignification was intended to be of Horn, that, neither could rain or froft fall (fee Ryne in the glosfary), or fun fhine, upon a "Feyrore child then

he was.

V. 61. So fele myhten ethe

Bring thre to dethe.]

In the old French fragment, allready defcribe'd, Aaluf is fay'd to have been slain, in one place, by Romuld le malfe, in another, by Rollac, the fon of

Godebrand, and nephew of Hildebrant and Herebrant, two African Saracen* kings, who, afterward, invade Weftness or Ireland.

V. 85. Horn child.] Doctor Percy, in a note upon Shakspeares tragedy of King Lear (Steevenses edition, P. 172), asferts " The word child (however it came to have this fenfe) is often applied to knights, &c." and that "The fame idiom occurs in Spenfers Faery queen, where the famous knight fir Tristram is frequently called Child Tristram." In this assertion, however, he has been fomewhat too haftey; Child Tristram, in Spenfer, being no knight at the time, but onely just dub'd fquire by fir Calidore. His reference, allfo, to " B. V. C. i. ft. 8. 13." is inaccurate; neither does B. VI. C. 8. ft. 15. relate to Tristram but to prince Arthur. Its proper fignification feems to be a youth or young man, or, perhap, man in general. Sir Tryamoure, in the romance under that title, is repeatedly call'd "the chylde," before he was made a knight. See fig. D. 4, 6,

V. 150. And feythene hethene kyng.]

This king is fuppofe'd to be Mody, the Saracen, whose death he here threatens, and whom he afterward flew. In the original his name is Romund:

"Kuant il fu od Romund en Suddene la lee." F. 59.

By thefe odious appellations the old Engleish writeërs un◄ derftood the Pagan Danes or Norwegians, who, in the nineth century, ravage'd Great-Britain and Ireland in every part. Geoffrey of Monmouth, it is remarkable, calls Gormund (a welknown king of the Danes, defeated, and baptise'd by king Alfred) king of the Africans (B. 11, C. s): and, in the spurious laws of Edward the confesfour, it is asferted that king Arthur defeated the Saracens (meaning, peradventure, the pagan Saxons).

V. 161. By dales and by dounes,
The children eoden to tounes,

Metten hue Eylmer the kyng,
Chrift him yeve ged tymyng,
Kyng of Weftneffe.]

Horn and his play-fellows have arrive'd in this country, from Sudene, by fea. Weftnesse and Sudenne owe, therefor, to be different countrys, more especially as Horn fends a mesfage back from the former to the latter. (V. 149.) That Aylmer, however, the father of Rymenild, who is here king of Weftneffe, is, in the French MS. Hunlaf, the father of Rimel, (king of Suddene,) who is elsewhere fay'd to have reign'd in Bretaigne, where he had refideëd at Lions (Caer Leon?) a brave city. "Li rois a Lions keft cité vaillant." At V. 954. Horn fays of himself

"Ich feche from Weftnesse

Horn knight of Eftneffe."

He is now in Ireland, whence he returns to Weftnesse (V. 1021); where Rymenild was (V. 960). He calls himself, in another place, "Horn of Weftneffe" (V. 1215). There are two placeës,, in Holderness, Yorkshire, call'd Eaft-nefs and Weft-nefs, at this day; but nefs, in that county, fignifys, merely, an inlet of water; in Scotland it means a nofe, promontory, or head-land, juting out into the fea; as Buchan-ness, Fife-ness, &c.

V. 170. Whenne be ye, gomen.] A mistake, it is posfible, for whence, unless whenne can be found elfewhere with the fame fignification.

*The French MS. makes Horn fay he wil go to fee her in Bretaine, (where, it elsewhere appears, Hunlaf, her father, reign'd): fo that Britain seems to be the fame with Weftiness or Suddene.