Ra soi madona a r'ha brassaja Suvra u so coffu a r'ha minèe; Uardèe qui, ra me noiretta, Le bele gioje che vi vôi dunèe. Mi n'ho csa fè dle vostre gioje; E manc ancur dla vostra cà; Cma ca voja dir bel gioje Ra me mama m' na mandirà.
To comparative mythologists in general, and to English students in particular, the most interesting of these rare Italian Ballads is undoubtedly one known as _L'Avvelenato_.[349] So far as I am aware, it is unique in the Italian language; nor had its correspondences with Northern Ballad-literature been noticed until I pointed them out in 1879.[350] In his work on popular Italian poetry, Professor D'Ancona included the following song, which he had heard upon the lips of a young peasant of the Pisan district[351]:
Dov'eri 'ersera a cena Caro mio figlio, savio e gentil? Mi fai morire Ohimè! Dov'eri 'ersera a cena Gentile mio cavalier?-- Ero dalla mia dama; Mio core stà male, Che male mi stà! Ero dalla mia dama; 'L mio core che se ne và.-- Che ti diènno da cena, Caro mio figlio, savio e gentil? Mi fai morire, Ohimè! Che ti diènno da cena, Gentile mio cavalier?-- Un anguilletta arrosto, Cara mia madre; Mio core stà male, Che male mi stà! Un anguilletta arrosto, 'L mio core che se ne và.
Other versions of the same poem occur in the dialects of Venice, Como and Lecco with such variations as prove them all to be the offshoots from some original now lost in great antiquity. That it existed and was famous so far back as the middle of the seventeenth century, is proved by an allusion in the _Cicalata in lode della Padella e della Frittura_, recited before the Accademia della Crusca by Lorenzo Panciatichi in 1656.[352] A few lines are also quoted in the _incatenatura_ of the Cieco Fiorentino, published at Verona in 1629.[353] Any one who is familiar with our Border Minstrelsy will perceive at once that this is only an Italian version of the Ballad of Lord Donald or Lord Randal.[354] The identity between the two is rendered still more striking by an analysis of the several Lombard versions. In that of Como, for example, the young man makes his will; and this is the last verse[355]:
Cossa lassè alla vostra dama, Figliuol mio caro, fiorito e gentil, Cossa lassè alla vostra dama? La fôrca da impiccarla, Signora mama, mio cor sta mal! La fôrca da impiccarla: Ohimè, ch'io moro, ohimè!