in Hood_, p. 52.

Thryes Robin shot about,
And alway he slist the wand,
And so dyde good _Gylberte
With the White Hand_.

_Hay of Nachton_ I take to be the knight, mentioned by Wintown, whose
feats of war and travel may have become the subject of a romance, or
ballad. He fought, in Flanders, under Alexander, Earl of Mar, in 1408,
and is thus described;

Lord of the Nachtane, schire William,
Ane honest knycht, and of gud fame,
A travalit knycht lang before than.

And again, before an engagement,

The lord of Nachtane, schire William
The Hay, a knycht than of gud fame,
Mad schire Gilberte the Hay, knycht.

_Cronykil_, B. IX. c. 27.

I apprehend we should read "How Hay of Nachton _slew_ in Madin Land."
Perhaps Madin is a corruption for Maylin, or Milan Land.]

The descendant of Auld Maitland, Sir Richard of Lethington, seems to
have been frequently complimented on the popular renown of his great
ancestor. We have already seen one instance; and in an elegant copy
of verses in the Maitland MSS., in praise of Sir Richard's seat of
Lethingtoun, which he had built, or greatly improved, this obvious
topic of flattery does not escape the poet. From the terms of his
panegyric we learn, that the exploits of auld Sir Richard with the
gray beard, and of his three sons, were "sung in many far countrie,
albeit in rural rhyme;" from which we may infer, that they were
narrated rather in the shape of a popular ballad, than in a _romance
of price_. If this be the case, the song, now published, may have
undergone little variation since the date of the Maitland MSS.; for,
divesting the poem, in praise of Lethington, of its antique spelling,
it would run as smoothly, and appear as modern, as any verse in the
following ballad. The lines alluded to, are addressed to the castle of
Lethington:

And happie art thou sic a place,
That few thy mak ar sene:
But yit mair happie far that race
To quhome thou dois pertene.
Quha dais not knaw the Maitland bluid,
The best in all this land?
In quhilk sumtyme the honour stuid
And worship of Scotland.

Of auld Sir Richard, of that name,
We have hard sing and say;
Of his triumphant nobill fame,
And of his auld baird gray.
And of his nobill sonnis three,
Quhilk that tyme had no maik;
Quhilk maid Scotland renounit be,
And all England to quaik.

Quhais luifing praysis, maid trewlie,
Efter that simple tyme,
Ar sung in monie far cou