and it may be interpreted in both the singing and the transcription. This is one version: "Sir Patrick Spens" The king sits in Dunfermline toune drinking the blude reid wine, "O whar can I get skeely skipper, To sail this ship o' mine?" Up and spak an eldern knicht, Sat at the kings richt kne: "Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailor That sails upon the se." The king has written a braid letter, And signed it wi his hand, And sent it to Sir Patrick Spens, Was walking on the strand. To Noroway! to Noroway! to Noroway oer the faem! The king's daughter to Noroway 'Tis thou maun bring her hame. The first line that Sir Patrick red, A loud lauch lauched he; The next line that Sir Patrick red, A teir blinded his ee. "O wha is this has don this deid, This ill deid don to me, To send me out this time o' yeir, To sail upon the se! "Mak haste, mak haste, my mirry men, Our guid ship sails the morne": "O say na sae, my master deir, I feir a deadlie storme. "Yestreen I saw the new moone, Wi the auld moone in her arme, And I feir, I feir, my master deir, That we will cum to harme." O loth, o loth, The Scots lords were To weet their cork-heild schoone; Bot lang owre a' the play wer playd, Thair hats they swam aboone. O lang, lang may the ladies sit, Wi' their fans into their hand Or ere they see Sir Patrick Spens Come sailing to the strand. O lang, lang may the ladies stand, Wi thair gold kems in their hair, Waiting for thair ain deir lords, For they'll se thame na mair. Haf owre, haf owre to Aberdour, Tis fiftie fathom deip, And thair lies guid Sir Patrick Spens, The Scots lords at his feit. Analysis The story itself is simple and yet universal in its theme: the courageous knight dutifully obeys the command of his king despite the knowledge that he will almost certainly be going to his death. In the two-stanza exchange between Spens and the old sailor, Mark Strand and Eavan Boland have noted "the immediacy, music, and fatalism of the ballad..." William Bowman Piper identifies a pattern of contrasts between authority, represented by the anonymous king, and nobility, as displayed by Patrick Spens. The references to