1. This ballad introduces a group in which the supernatural plays a part. Here it is a version of a theme very popular in folklore in which a mortal lover woos a fairy. Such legends give various ways in which a mortal may win access to the world of enchantment; sometimes he crosses a bridge, or is ferried across a stream in a boat that moves without oars or sails. Often he meets a strange being, as here.

2. Describe the "wee, wee man." Compare the use of the fairy element in this ballad with its use in A Midsummer Night's Dream (in Junior High School Literature Book II).

3. In line 20 the "lady fine" is a fairy. How do you know? The story is obviously incomplete. What do you suppose happened?

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

1. There was a Thomas the Rymer (a minstrel) who lived in the latter part of the thirteenth century. There are many legends about him. This ballad is at least a century older than Shakespeare's plays.

2. The ballad should be compared with "The Wee, Wee Man." In what way is it more complete? How do the two ballads resemble each other?

3. Note carefully the following details and explain from them what you think they indicate as to popular belief in such stories: (a) Thomas thinks the lady is Queen of Heaven; who is she? (b) They pass through blood forty days and forty nights; there are other strange aspects of nature. (c) Thomas is not allowed to eat the fruit in the "garden green." (d) The three roads and what they represent. 4. Note the use of numbers in this ballad. Have you any explanation? What other fairy-tale elements do you find in the ballad?

grief; was the ballad maker intent upon something more amazing than sorrow for the dead? What is the occurrence to which everything else in the ballad is subordinated?

4. How do we learn that the three sons did not return "in earthly flesh and blood"? Does the mother realize this or not? Does anything in the story tell you?

5. Of what is the crowing of the cock a sign? During what hours did popular superstition hold that spirits and elves had power?

6. Note that the ghosts are taken as a matter of course. There is no attempt to arouse a feeling of horror in the reader or hearer. Compare this attitude toward the supernatural or the weird with that found in other forms of literature, such as a story by Poe or the ghosts in Shakespeare's dramas.