Page:Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript. Ballads and Romances.djvu/39

 i. 13) for his Popular Ballads and Songs (1806), and Sir Frederic Madden, who was allowed by one of Percy's daughters, Mrs. Isted, I believe to print The Grene Knight, The Carle of Carlisle, and The Turke and Gowin, in his Syr Gawayne for the Bannatyne Club, 1839. The reason given for refusing all other applicants was, I am told, that some member of the family might some day like to edit the book himself. But a glimpse of its contents was given to the public by Dr. Didlin, who copied from Percy's list the first 72 entries, and would undoubtedly have finished the whole—says my informant—had he not been stopt as soon as his entertainers found out what he was up to. His account is given in a note to his Decameron, as follows:

It was in the winter of 1815, when I visited, for the second time, the worthy and hospitable owners of Ecton Hall, in Northamptonshire: Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Isted: the lady of the mansion, being the eldest daughter of the old-poetry-loving Prelate of whom we are discoursing. The snow was on the ground : the heavens were turbid; the air was sharp and biting, and the hours of daylight were necessarily few. At such a season, and in such a mansion, what could be more delightful and congenial, than, sitting by the side of a blazing fire, the inspection of the MS. which formed the basis of the Bishop's celebrated "," published for the first time in 1765, in three crown octavo volumes?! But what was there in this MS. so wondrously fascinating? I will tell thee, good-natured, and by this time, I trust, thoroughly-composed reader. The Bishop's work was no sooner out, than the critics "roared aloud" for a sight of MS. ! and among these "roarers" (more vociferous than Bottom's "nightingale" or " sucking-dove ") no one opened his mouth so widely, or sent forth a more hideous yell, than the late : who at once, in imitation of Alexander the Great, drew his tremendous sabre, and cut the Gordian knot—by denying the existence of the MS., and thereby implying that Dr. Percy had foisted a lie upon the public! In spite of assurances and demonstrations to the contrary, and in defiance of the Doctor's acknowledged respectability of character, Ritson went on, "roaring