Note 136 — 234 CHARLIE MACPHERSON
Reading edition
“I have lately, by rummaging in a by-corner of my memory, found some Aberdeenshire ballads which totally escaped me before. They are of a different class from those I sent you, not near so ancient, but may be about a century ago. I cannot boast much of their poetical merits, but the family incidents upon which they are founded, the local allusions which they contain, may perhaps render them curious and not uninteresting to many people. They are as follows: 1st, ‘The Baron of Braichly’ [No 203]; 2d, ‘The Lass of Philorth [No 239 ?];’ 3d, ‘The Tryal of the Laird of Gycht’ [No 209]; 4th, ‘The Death of the Countess of Aboyne’ [No 235]; 5[th], ‘The Carrying-off of the Heiress of Kinady.’ All these I can recollect pretty exactly. I never saw any of them either in print or manuscript, but have kept them entirely from hearing them sung when a child.” Letter to Alexander Fraser Tytler, December 23, 1800.
‘Charlie MacPherson’ should have been put with Nos 221–5.