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"WE UNDERSTANDING that owre burgh of Selkirk and inhabitants thairof CONTINUALIE SEN THE FIELD OF FLODOUNE has been oppressiit heriit and owre runin be theves and traitors whairthrow the haunt of merchandice has cessit amangis thame of langtyme bygane and thai heriit thairthrow and we defraudit of owre custumis and dewites-THAIR FOR and for divers utheris resonable causis and considerationes moving us be the tenor heirof of our kinglie power fre motive and autoritie ryall grantis and givis to thame and thair successors ane fair day begynand at the feist of the Conception of owre Lady next to cum aftere the day of the date hereof and be the octavis of the sammyn perpetualy in time cuming To be usit and exercit be thame als frelie in time cuming as ony uther fair is usit or exercit be ony otheris owre burrowis within owre realme payand yeirlie custumis and doweities aucht and wont as effeiris frelie quietlie wele and in pece but ony revocation obstakill impediment or agane calling whatsumever Subscrivet with owre hand and gevin under owre Signet at KIRKALDY the secund day of September The yere of God ane thousand five hundreth and threty sex yeris and of owre regne the twenty three yeir." The charter of confirmation, in which all these deeds and letters of donation are engrossed, proceeds to ratify and confirm them in the most ample manner. The testing clause, as it is termed in law language, is in these words: "In cujus rei "Testimonium huic presente carte nostre confirma"tionis magnum sigillum nostrum apponi precepimus TESTIBUS Reverendissimo reverendisque in "Christo Patribus Gawino Archiepiscopo Glasguen. "Cancellario nostro; Georgio Episcopo Dunkelden. "Henrico Episcopo Candide Case nostreque Capelle

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in consequence of the fatal field of Flodden. But further, it seems reasonable to infer, that so many marks of royal favour, granted within so short a time of each other, evince the gratitude, as well as the compassion, of the monarch, and were intended to reward the valour, as well as to relieve the distress, of the men of Selkirk. Thus every circumstance of the written evidence, as far as it goes, tallies with the oral tradition of the inhabitants; and, therefore, though the latter may be exaggerated, it surely cannot be dismissed as entirely void of foundation. That William Brydone actually enjoyed the honour of knighthood, is ascertained by many of the deeds, in which his name appears as a notarypublic. John Brydone, lineal descendant of the gallant town-clerk, is still alive, and possessed of the relics mentioned by Mr. Robertson. The old man, though in an inferior station of life, receives considerable attention from his fellow-citizens, and claims no small merit to himself on account of his brave ancestor."

Thus far concerning the tradition of the exploits of the men of Selkirk, at Flodden field. Whether the following verses do, or do not, bear any allusion to that event, is a separate and less interesting question. The opinion of Mr. Robertson, referring them to a different origin, has been already mentioned; but his authority, though highly respectable, is not absolutely decisive of the question.

The late Mr. Plummer,' sheriff-depute of the county of Selkirk, a faithful and accurate antiquary, entertained a very opposite opinion. He has thus expressed himself upon the subject, in the course of his literary correspondence with Mr. Herd :— "Of the Souters of Selkirk, I never heard any words but the following verse:

'Up with the Souters of Selkirk, And down wi' the Earl of Home; And up wi' a' the bra' lads

That sew the single-soled shoon.'

regie Strivilengen. decano; dilectis nostris consan66 Iguineis Jacobo Moravie Comite, etc. Archibaldo "Comite de Ergile Domino Campbell et Lorne Ma"gistro Hospicii nostri, Hugone Comite de Eglinton "Domino Montgomery, Malcolmo Domino Flemyng 66 magno Camerario nostro, Venerabilibus in Christo "Patribus Patricio Priore Ecclesie Metropolitane "Sanctiandree, Alexandro Abbate Monasterii nostri "de Cambuskynneth-dilectis familiaribus nostris "Thomæ Erskin de Brechin, Secretario nostro Ja"cobo Colville de Estwemis compotorum nostrorum "rotulatore et nostre cancellarie directore, militibus, "Our clergyman, in the Statistical Account,' "et Magistro Jacobo Foulis de Colintoun nostrorum vol. ii. p. 48, note, says, that these words were com"rotulorum Registri et Concilii clerico-apud Edin-posed upon a match at foot-ball, between the Philipburgh octavo die mensis Aprilis Anno Domini mil-haugh and Home families. I was five years at school "lesimo quingentesimo trigesimo octavo et regni at Selkirk, have lived all my days within two miles "nostri vicesimo quinto."

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From these extracts, which are accurately copied from the original charters, it may be safely concluded, 1st, that Selkirk was a place of importance before it was ruined by the English; and, 2d, "that the voice of merchants had ceased in her streets,"

The charters are preserved in the records of the burgh. • This person is lately dead, but his son is in possession of the weapons in question. 1810.

"It is evident that these words cannot be so ancient as to come near the time when the battle was fought; as Lord Home was not created an Earl till near a century after that period.

of that town, and never once heard a tradition of this imaginary contest till I saw it in print.

"Although the words are not very ancient, there is every reason to believe, that they allude to the battle of Flodden, and to the different behaviour of the souters, and Lord Home, upon that occasion.

3 [Andrew Plammer, Esq., of Sunderland Hall, Selkirkshire. -ED.]

At election dinners, etc., when the Selkirk folks
begin to get fou' (merry), they always call for music,
and for that tune in particular.' At such times I
never heard a souter hint at the foot-ball, but many
times speak of the battle of Flodden."-Letter from
Mr. Plummer to Mr. Herd, 13th January, 1793.
The Editor has taken every opportunity, which his
situation has afforded him, to obtain information
on this point, and has been enabled to recover two
additional verses of the song.

The yellow and green, mentioned in the second verse, are the liveries of the house of Home. When the Lord Home came to attend the governor, Albany, his attendants were arrayed in Kendal-green.Godscroft.

THE SOUTERS OF SELKIRK.

Up wi' the Souters of Selkirk,

And down wi' the Earl of Home; And up wi' a' the braw lads,

That sew the single-soled shoon.

Fye upon yellow and yellow,

And fye upon yellow and green, But up wi' the true blue and scarlet, And up wi' the single-soled sheen.

Up wi' the Souters o' Selkirk,

For they are baith trusty and leal; And up wi' the Men o' the Forest, 3

And down wi' the Merse to the deil.

A singular custom is observed at conferring the freedom of the burgh. Four or five bristles, such as are used by shoemakers, are attached to the seal of the burgess ticket. These the newmade burgess must dip in his wine, and pass through his mouth, in token of respect for the souters of Selkirk. This ceremony is on no account dispensed with.

2 That the Editor succeeded Mr. Plummer in his office of sheriffdepute, and has himself the honour to be a souter of Selkirk, may perhaps form the best apology for the length of this dissertation. 3 Selkirkshire, otherwise called Ettrick Forest. 4 Berwickshire, otherwise called the Merse.

THE FLOWERS OF THE FOREST.

PART FIRST.

The following well-known and beautiful stanzas were composed, many years ago, by a lady of family in Roxburghshire. The manner of the ancient minstrels is so happily imitated, that it required the most positive evidence to convince the Editor that the song was of modern date. Such evidence, however, he has been able to procure; having been favoured, through the kind intervention of Dr. Somerville (well known to the literary world, as the historian of King William, etc.), with the following authentic copy of the Flowers of the Forest.

From the same respectable authority, the Editor is enabled to state, that the tune of the ballad is ancient, as well as the two following lines of the first

stanza :

I've heard them lilting at the ewes milking,

The flowers of the forest are a' wede away.

Some years after the song was composed, a lady, who is now dead, repeated to the author another imperfect line of the original ballad, which presents a simple and affecting image to the mind;

"I ride single on my saddle,

For the flowers of the forest are a' wede away."

The first of these trifling fragments, joined to the remembrance of the fatal battle of Flodden, (in the calamities accompanying which the inhabitants of Et

advantage on the English part, that they seem actually to have set up pretensions to the victory.* The same temper of mind led them eagerly to ascribe the loss of their monarch, and his army, to any cause, rather than to his own misconduct, and the superior military skill of the English. There can be no doubt, that James actually fell on the field of battle, the slaughter-place of his nobles. -PINKERTON, ibid. His dead body was interred in the monastery of Sheen, in Surrey; and Stowe mentions, with regard to it, the following degrading circumstances:

"After the battle the bodie of the said king, being found, was closed in lead, and conveyed from thence to London, and to the 5 It is unnecessary here to enter into a formal refutation of the monasterie of Sheyne, in Surry, where it remained for a time, in popular calumny, which taxed Lord Home with being the mur- what order I am not certaine; but, since the dissolution of that derer of his sovereign, and the cause of the defeat at Flodden. house, in the reign of Edward VI., Henry Gray, Duke of NorSo far from exhibiting any marks of cowardice or disaffection, the folke, being lodged, and keeping house there, I have been shewed division headed by that unfortunate nobleman, was the only part the same bodie, so lapped in lead, close to the head and bodie, of the Scottish army which was conducted with common pru- throwne into a waste room, amongst the old timber, lead, and dence on that fatal day. This body formed the vanguard, and other rubble. Since the which time, workmen there, for their entirely routed the division of Sir Edmund Howard, to which they foolish pleasure, hewed off his head; and Lancelot Young, master were opposed; but the reserve of the English cavalry rendered it glazier to Queen Elizabeth, feeling a sweet savour to come from impossible for Home, notwithstanding his success, to come to the thence, and seeing the same dried from all moisture, and yet the aid of the king, who was irretrievably ruined by his own impe- form remaining, with haire of the head, and beard red, brought tuosity of temper.-PINKERTON'S History, vol. ii. p. 105. The it to London, to his house in Wood-street, where, for a time, he escape of James from the field of battle has long been deservedly kept it, for its sweetness, but, in the end, caused the sexton of ranked with that of King Sebastian, and similar speciosa mira- that church (St. Michael's, Wood-street) to bury it amongst other cula with which the vulgar have been amused in all ages. bones taken out of their charnel."-STOWE'S Survey of London, deed, the Scottish nation were so very unwilling to admit any p. 539.

"Against the proud Scotte's clattering,
That never wyll leave their trattlying:
Wan they the field and lost theyr king?
They may well say, fle on that winning!
"Lo these fond sottes and trattlying Scottes,
How they are blinde in their own minde,

In

And will not know theyr overthrow,

At Branxton moore they are so stowre,
So frantike mad, and say they had,

And wan the field with speare and shielde:
That is as true as black is blue," etc.

Skelton Laureate against the Scolles.

trick Forest suffered a distinguished share,) and to the present solitary and desolate appearance of the country, excited, in the mind of the author, the ideas, which she has expressed in strain of elegiac simplicity and tenderness, which has seldom been equalled.

THE FLOWERS OF THE FOREST.

PART FIRST.

I've heard them lilting,' at the ewe-milking,
Lasses a' lilting, before dawn of day;

But now they are moaning on ilka green loaning;
The flowers of the forest are a' wede awae.

At bughts, in the morning, nae blythe lads are scorning;

Lasses are lonely, and dowie, and wae;
Nae daffing, nae gabbing, but sighing and sabbing;
Ilk ane lifts her leglin, and hies her awae.

In har'st, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering:
Bandsters are runkled, and lyart or gray;
At fair, or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching;

2

The flowers of the forest are a' wede awae.

At e'en, in the gloaming, nae younkers are roaming
'Bout stacks with the lasses at bogle to play;
But ilk maid sits dreary, lamenting her deary—
The flowers of the forest are weded awae.

THE FLOWERS OF THE FOREST.

PART SECOND.

The following verses, adapted to the ancient air of the Flowers of the Forest, are like the elegy which precedes them, the production of a lady. The late Mrs. Cockburn, daughter of Rutherford of Fairnalie, in Selkirkshire, and relict of Mr. Cockburn of Ormiston, (whose father was Lord Justice-Clerk of Scotland,) was the authoress. Mrs. Cockburn has been dead but a few years.4 Even at an age, advanced beyond the usual bounds of humanity, she retained a play of imagination, and an activity of intellect, which must have been attractive and delightful in youth, but were almost preternatural at her period of life. Her active benevolence, keeping pace with her genius, rendered her equally an object of love and admiration. The Editor, who knew her well, takes this opportunity of doing justice to his own feelings; and they are in unison with those of all who knew his re

gretted friend.

The verses which follow were written at an early period of life, and without peculiar relation to any event, unless it were the depopulation of Ettrick Forest.

I've seen the smiling of Fortune beguiling, I've tasted her favours, and felt her decay :

Dool and wae for the order, sent our lads to the Bor- Sweet is her blessing, and kind her caressing,

der!

The English, for ance, by guile wan the day : The flowers of the forest, that fought aye the fore

most,

The prime of our land, are cauld in the clay.

We'll hear nae mair lilting, at the ewe-milking; Women and bairns are heartless and wae; Sighing and moaning on ilka green loaning

The flowers of the forest are a' wede awae.3

The following explanation of provincial terms may be found useful.

Lilling-Singing cheerfully. Loaning-A broad lane. Wede awae-Weeded out. Scorning-Rallying. Dowie - Dreary. Daffing and gabbing-Joking and chatting. Leglin―Milk-pail. Har'st-Harvest. Shearing-Reaping. Bandsters-Sheaf-binders. Runkled-Wrinkled. Lyart-Inclining to grey. Fleeching -Coaxing. Gloaming-Twilight.

These lines have been said to contain an anachronism; the supposed date of the lamentation being about the period of the Field of Flodden. The Editor can see no ground for this charge. Fairs were held in Scotland from the most remote antiquity; and are, from their very nature, scenes of pleasure and gallantry. The preachings of the friars were, indeed, professedly, meetings for a graver purpose; but we have the authority of the Wife of Bath, (surely most unquestionable in such a point,) that they were frequently perverted to places of rendezvous :

"I had the better leisur for to pleie,

And for to see, and eke to be sele

of lusty folk. What wist 1 where my grace

Was shapen for to be, or in what place
Therefore I made my visitations

To vigilies and to processions;

But soon it is fled-it is fled far away.

I've seen the forest adorn'd of the foremost,

With flowers of the fairest, both pleasant and gay; Full sweet was their blooming, their scent the air

perfuming,

But now are they wither'd, and a' wede awae.

I've seen the morning with gold the hills adorning, And the red storm roaring, before the parting day:

To preachings eke, and to thise pilgrimages,
To plays of miracles, and marriages," etc.
Canterbury Tales.

3 ["It is the business of poetry to delineate feeling; and where shall we look for feeling so undisguised and powerful, as in those early periods of civilisation, which have already excited men to the cultivation of their intellectual energies-but have not yet fettered them with that multiplicity of rules which forms them into the mere machines of polished society? The minds of men in such a state are indeed less delicate, less attractive of general sympathy, than in succeeding periods; but they are more poetic, more interesting in particular contemplation, more distinctly marked and intelligible. We are not, then, to view these poems as facta ad unguem-high-polished and elaborate specimens of art-but as exhibiting the true sparks and flashes of individual nature. Hence we shall find a savage wildness in the superstition of the Lyke-wake Dirge, and in the tumultuous rage of the Fray of Suport; but we may trace gradations from these to the exquisite tenderness of the Flowers of the Forest."-Edin. Rev. 1805. 4 Edition of 1803.

5 [Mrs. Cockburn was an intimate friend of Mrs. Scott, and among the first persons who discovered the expanding genius of ber son.-ED.]

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This Ballad is a fragment from Mr. Herd's MS., communicated to him by J. GROSSETT MUIRHEAD, Esq. of Breadesholm, near Glasgow; who stated that he extracted it, as relating to his own family, from the complete Song, in which the names of twenty or thirty gentlemen were mentioned, contained in a large Collection, belonging to Mr. ALEXANDER MONRO, merchant in Lisbon, but supposed now to be lost.

It appears, from the Appendix to NISBET's Heraldry, p. 264, that MUIRHEAD of Lachop and Bullis, the person here called the Laird of MUIRHEAD, was a man of rank, being rentaller, or perhaps feuar, of many crown lands in Galloway; and was, in truth, slain in "Campo Belli de Northumberland sub vexillo Regis," i. e. in the Field of Flodden.

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Afore the King in order stude

The stout laird of Muirhead,

Wi' that same twa-hand muckle sword
That Bartram fell'd stark dead.

He sware he wadna lose his right
To fight in ilka field;

Nor budge him from his liege's sight,
Till his last gasp should yield.

Twa hunder mair, of his ain name,
Frae Torwood and the Clyde,
Sware they would never gang to hame,

But a' die by his syde.

And wondrous well they kept their troth; This sturdy royal band

Rush'd down the brae, wi' sic a pith,

That nane could them withstand.

Drumly-Discoloured.

[These verses of Dr. Leyden appear to have been introduced in this place, as forming a sort of note on the Flowers of the Forest. Among them are the four beautiful lines which were selected for the motto to Marmion

"Alas! that Scottish maid should sing," etc.-ED.]

3 Under the vigorous administration of James IV., the young Earl of Caithness incurred the penalty of outlawry and forfeiture, for revenging an ancient feud. On the evening preceding the battle of Flodden, accompanied by 300 young warriors, arrayed in green, he presented himself before the King, and submitted to

Mony a bloody blow they dealt,
The like was never seen;

And hadna that braw leader fall'n,
They ne'er had slain the king.

ODE

ON VISITING FLODDEN.

BY J. LEYDEN."

Green Flodden! on thy blood-stain'd head
Descend no rain nor vernal dew;
But still, thou charnel of the dead,

May whitening bones thy surface strew!
Soon as I tread thy rush-clad vale,
Wild fancy feels the clasping mail;
The rancour of a thousand years
Glows in my breast; again I burn
To see the banner'd pomp of war return,
And mark, beneath the moon, the silver light of
Lo! bursting from their common tomb,
The spirits of the ancient dead
Dimly streak the parted gloom

With awful faces, ghastly red;
As once, around their martial king,
They closed the death-devoted ring,
With dauntless hearts, unknown to yield;

In slow procession round the pile

[spears.

Of heaving corses, moves each shadowy file, [field. And chants, in solemn strain, the dirge of Flodden What youth, of graceful form and mien,

Foremost leads the spectred brave, While o'er his mantle's folds of green

His amber locks redundant wave?
When slow returns the fated day,

That view'd their chieftain's long array,
Wild to the harp's deep plaintive string,
The virgins raise the funeral strain,

From Ord's black mountain to the northern main, And mourn the emerald hue which paints the vest of spring. '

Alas! that Scottish maid should sing

The combat where her lover fell!
That Scottish bard should wake the string,
The triumph of our foes to tell!
Yet Teviot's sons, with high disdain,
Have kindled at the thrilling strain,

his mercy. This mark of attachment was so agreeable to that warlike prince, that he granted an immunity to the Earl and all his followers. T'.e parchment on which this immunity was inscribed, is said to be still preserved in the archives of the Earls of Caithness, and is marked with the drum-strings, having been cut out of a drumhead, as no other parchment could be found in the army. The Earl and his gallant band perished to a man in the battle of Flodden; since which period, it has been reckoned unlucky in Caithness to wear green, or cross the Ord on a Monday, the day of the week on which the Chieftain advanced into Sutherland.

That mourn'd their martial fathers' bier; And at the sacred font, the priest

T

Through ages left the master-hand unblest, To urge, with keener aim, the blood-encrusted spear. Red Flodden! when thy plaintive strain In early youth rose soft and sweet, My life-blood, through each throbbing vein, With wild tumultuous passion beat; And oft, in fancied might, I trode The spear-strewn path to Fame's abode, Encircled with a sanguine flood;

And thought I heard the mingling hum,
When, croaking hoarse, the birds of carrion come
Afar, on rustling wing, to feast on English blood.

Rude Border Chiefs, of mighty name,
And iron soul, who sternly tore
The blossoms from the tree of fame,

And purpled deep their tints with gore,
Rush from brown ruins, scarr'd with age,
That frown o'er haunted Hermitage;
Where, long by spells mysterious bound,
They pace their round, with lifeless smile,
And shake, with restless foot, the guilty pile,
Till sink the mouldering towers beneath the burden'd
ground.'

Shades of the dead! on Alfer's plain

Who scorned with backward step to move,
But struggling 'mid the hills of slain,

Against the Sacred Standard strove;'
Amid the lanes of war I trace
Each broad claymore and ponderous mace:
Where'er the surge of arms is tost,

Your glittering spears, in close array,
Sweep, like the spider's filmy web, away [host.
The flower of Norman pride, and England's victor

But distant fleets each warrior ghost,
With surly sounds that murmur far;
Such sounds were heard when Syria's host

Roll'd from the walls of proud Samàr. Around my solitary head

Gleam the blue lightnings of the dead, While murmur low the shadowy band"Lament no more the warrior's doom! Blood, blood alone, should dew the hero's tomb, Who falls, 'mid circling spears, to save his native land."

ESSAY

OR

IMITATIONS OF THE ANCIENT BALLAD.4

The invention of printing necessarily occasioned the downfall of the Order of Minstrels, already reduced to contempt by their own bad habits, by the disrepute attached to their profession, and by the laws calculated to repress their license. When the Metrical Romances were very many of them in the hands of every one, the occupation of those who made their living by reciting them was in some degree abolished, and the minstrels either disappeared altogether, or sunk into mere musicians, whose utmost acquaintance with poetry was being able to sing a ballad. Perhaps old Anthony, who acquired, from the song which he accounted his masterpiece, the name of Anthony Now Now, was one of the last of this class in the capital; nor does the tenor of his poetry evince whether it was his own composition, or that of some other.5

But the taste for popular poetry did not decay with the class of men by whom it had been for some generations practised and preserved. Not only did the simple old ballads retain their ground, though circulated by the new art of printing, instead of being preserved by recitation; but in the Garlands, and similar collections for general sale, the authors aimed at a more ornamental and regular style of poetry than had been attempted by the old minstrels, whose composition, if not extemporaneous, was seldom committed to writing, and was not, therefore, susceptible of accurate revision. This was the more necessary, as even the popular poetry was now feeling the effects arising from the advance of knowledge, and the revival of the study of the learned languages, with all the elegance and refinement which it induced.

In the Border counties of Scotland, it was formerly customary, when any rancorous enmity subsisted between two clans, to leave the right hand of male children unchristened, that it might deal the more deadly, or, according to the popular phrase. "unhallowed" blows to their enemies. By this superstitious rite, they were devoted to bear the family feud, or enmity. The same practice subsisted in Ireland, as appears from the following passage in CHAMPION'S History of Ireland, published in 1633. "In some corners of the land they used a damnable superstition, leaving the right armes of their infants, males, unchristened, (as they termed it,) to the end it might give a more ungracious and deadly blow."-P. 15. → Popular superstition in Scotland still retains so formidable an idea of the guilt of blood, that those ancient edifices, or castles, where enormous crimes have been committed, are supposed to sink gradually into the ground. With regard to the castle of Hermitage, in particular, the common people believe, that thirty feet of the walls sunk, thirty feet fell, and thirty feet remain standing.

* The fatal battle of the Standard was fought on Cowton Moor, near Northallerton, (A. E. Balfertun,) in Yorkshire, 1138. David I. commanded the Scottish army. He was opposed by Thurston, Archbishop of York, who, to animate his followers, had recourse to the impression of religious enthusiasm. The mast of a ship was fitted into the perch of a four-wheeled carriage; on its

top was placed a little casket, containing a consecrated host. It also contained the banner of St. Cuthbert, round which were displayed those of St. Peter of York, St. John of Beverley, and St. Wilfred of Rippon. This was the English standard, and was stationed in the centre of the army. Prince Henry, son of David, at the head of the men-of-arms, chiefly from Cumberland and Teviotdale, charged, broke, and completely dispersed the centre; but unfortunately was not supported by the other divisions of the Scottish army. The expression of Alfred, (p. 345,) describing this encounter, is more spirited than the general tenor of monkish historians;-"Ipsa globi australis parte instar cassis araneœ dissipata."-that division of the phalanx was dispersed like a cobweb.

4 [This essay was written in April 1830, and forms a continuation of the "Remarks on Popular Poetry," printed in the beginning, of the present volume.-ED.]

5 He might be supposed a contemporary of Henry VIII., if the greeting which he pretends to have given to that monarch is of his own composition, and spoken in his own person.

"Good morrow to our noble king, quoth 1;

Good morrow, quoth he, to thou:

And then he said to Anthony,

O Anthony now now now."

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