IV. Sir Cauline. ............................................................................................................
This old romantic tale was preserved in the Editor's folio manuscript, but in so
very defective and mutilated a condition (not from any chasm in the manuscript, but
from great omission in the transcript, probably copied from the faulty recitation of
some illiterate minstrel), and the whole appeared so far short of the perfection it
seemed to deserve, that the Editor was tempted to add several stanzas in the first part,
and still more in the second, to connect and complete the story in the manner which
appeared to him most interesting and affecting.
There is something peculiar in the metre of this old ballad; it is not unusual to
meet with redundant stanzas of six lines; but the occasional insertion of a double third
or fourth line, is an irregularity I do not remember to have seen elsewhere.
It may be proper to inform the reader before he comes to Part 2, v. 110, 111,
that the ROUND TABLE was not peculiar to the reign of King Arthur, but was
common in all the ages of Chivalry. The proclaiming a great tournament (probably
with some peculiar solemnities) was called "holding a Round Table." Dugdale tells us
that the great baron Roger de Mortimer "having procured the honour of knighthood to
be conferred 'on his three sons' by King Edward I, he, at his own costs, caused a
tourneament to be held at Kenilworth; where he sumptuously entertained an hundred
knights, and as many ladies, for three days; the like whereof was never before in
England; and there began the ROUND TABLE, (so called by reason that the place
wherein they practised those feats was environed with a strong wall made in a round
form:) And upon the fourth day, the golden lion, in sign of triumph, being yielded to
him; he carried it (with all the company) to Warwick."-- It may further be added, that
Matthew Paris frequently calls justs and tournamentsHastiludia Mensæ Rotundæ.
As to what will be observed in this ballad of the art of healing being practised
by a young princess; it is no more than what is usual in all the old romances, and was
conformable to real manners: it being a practice derived from the earliest times among
all the Gothic and Celtic nations, for women, even of the highest rank, to exercise the
art of surgery. In theNorthern Chronicleswe always find the young damsels
stanching the wounds of their lovers, and the wives those of their husbands[1]. And
even so late as the time of Queen Elizabeth, it is mentioned among the
accomplishments of the ladies of her court, that the "eldest of them areskilful in
surgery." See Harrison'sDescription of England, prefixed to Hollingshed's Chronicle,
&c.
THE FIRST PARTIN Ireland, ferr over the sea,
There dwelleth a bonnye kinge
And with him a yong and comlye knighte,
Men call him Syr Caulìne.
The kinge had a ladye to his daughter,
In fashyon she hath no peere;
And princely wightes that ladye wooed
To be theyr wedded feere.
Syr Cauline loveth her best of all,
But nothing durst he saye;