Note 19 — ROBERT CHAMBERS.

Professor Aytoun says of this ballad, that 'it was adapted from the original by Sir Alexander Halket—at least, such was the general understanding until lately, when it became a mania with some literary antiquaries [a glance at the opinions of the present writer] to attribute the authorship of the great bulk of the Scottish ballads to Sir Alexander's sister, Lady Wardlaw, on the single ground that she was the composer of Hardyknute.' My learned friend is here very unlucky, for Lady Wardlaw had no brother, nor does any Sir Alexander Halket appear in her family history. This, however, is not all. It was a song to the tune of Gilderoy which was attributed to Sir Alexander Halket (Johnson's Scots Musical Museum)—namely, the well-known Ah, Chloris, which turns out to be a composition of Sir Charles Sedley, inserted by him in a play entitled the Mulberry Garden, which was acted in 1668.