LUSATIA, POLAND 279

replace a missing syllable. The music shows that the lines are to
be considered syllabically regular, despite the minstrel's occasional
failure to keep the count. It covers two, three, or four lines, but
most often three. The texts, however, as in Czechoslovakia, are
usually couplets in this case, and the third line is obtained by
repeating one of the others, though it occasionally appears to round
out the sense of the stanza. Couplets are also the texts for several
pieces of quatrain music. There are lyrical cries, usually formed
of unintelligible syllables, and repetitions of words, as in German,
but no proper refrains, as in Scotland and Scandinavia. Repeated
lines naturally rhyme with themselves, and the treatment of the
odd line is wont to be arbitrary. Assonance is the principle of
construction, and is obtained from the simplest grammatical devices
(diminutive suffixes, flexions of verbs, &c.); but it is so often absent
that it is evident the principle was not held in high esteem.

The Lusatian ballads have often the dignity and discretion which
is attached to genuine medieval balladry. Evidence that they reach
back to a good epoch is afforded by Handrias and Rajsenberk (i. 14),
which belongs to the ballads of robber barons. This anti-hero was
Christoph von Ressenberg, a belated practitioner of the gentle
trade, who was associated with Siegmund von Kauffung, a rogue
beheaded in 1534. The sixteenth century is indicated also by a
piece of more doubtful reference, The poisoned Lord (i. 57). The
lord is said to have been a king of Hungary, and he may be the
ill-fated Ludwig who perished at Alohacs in 1526, According to
the ballad the young lord drank poison in a cup offered him by a
Turkish woman, but his queen saw his soul go up to the bliss of
heaven. The evil Robbers (i. 2) are said to have been Tatars; in
Polish Galicia they are termed Tatars, and this may be due to the
fact that the Tatars have remained in the Ukraine until modern
times. In the Czech equivalent ballad they are said to have been
Turks. The name, therefore, is not necessarily proof of high
antiquity. In view of these identifications, it would appear hazar-
dous to follow the collectors of these ballads in their interpretation
of two others: Komm *runter, wiein Gretchen and The Sorbs'
Victories (i. 31,4). They take these up to the remote tenth century,
to the epoch of the German wars with the Wends; but the first
piece, with its German refrain, describes a Lusatian girl's choice
between three German pretenders, and the second celebrates three
victories over the Germans—themes which are equally interesting