attire--the ladies decorated with garlands of flowers, the gentlemen
with nosegays and flowers in their hats, assemble at the Town Hall,
and proceed to dance after the band, playing the traditional air.
They first trip in couples, hand in hand, during the first part
of the tune, forming a string of from thirty to forty couples, or
perhaps more; at the second part of the tune the first gentleman
turns with both hands the lady behind him, and her partner turns
in like manner with the first lady; then each gentleman turns his
own partner, and then they trip on as before. The other couples, of
course, pair and turn in the same way, and at the same time.

The dancing is not confined to the streets; the house doors are
thrown open, and the train of dancers enters by the front, dances
through the house, and out at the back, through the garden, and back
again. It is considered a slight to omit a house. Finally the train
enters the Assembly Room and there resolves itself into an ordinary
waltz.

As soon as the first party is finished, another goes through the same
evolutions, and then another, and so on, and it is not till late at
night that the town returns to its peaceful propriety.

There is a general holiday in the town on Flora Day, and so strictly
was this formerly adhered to, that anyone found working on that day
was compelled to jump across Pengella, a wide stream that discharges
its waters into Loo Pool. As this feat was almost impracticable,
it involved a sousing. The festival has by no means ceased to be
observed; it has rather, of late years, been revived in energetic
observance.

The "Helston Furry Dance" is a relic of part of the Old English May
Games. These originally comprised four entirely distinct parts.
1st. The election and procession of the King and Queen of the May,
who were called the Summer King and Queen. 2nd. The Morris Dance,
performed by men disguised, with swords in their hands. 3rd. The
"Hobby Horse." 4th. The "Robin Hood."

In the Helston performance we have a fragment only of the original
series of pageants; at Padstow the Hobby-horse still figures. I have
given the two Padstow songs in "A Garland of Country Song," 1895, No.
42.

The Helston Furry Dance tune was printed in Davies Gilbert's
"Christmas Carols," 2nd ed., 1823. His form is purer than ours, which
is as now sung. Edward Jones had already published it in his "Bardic
Museum," vol. ii. (1802) as "The Cornish May Song," and George
Johnson in his "Welsh Airs," vol. ii. (1811).

25. BLOW AWAY, YE MORNING BREEZES. Taken down, words and music, from
Robert Hard. This curious song was to be sung by two sopranos; that
is to say, one voice taunts the other, and the second replies, then
both unite in the chorus. We have omitted the retort, which consists
simply in the application of the same words to the first singer.
It is certainly an early composition. One passage in it occurs in
"The Knight and the Shepherd's Daughter," in Percy's "Relicks," and
Child's "English and Scotch Ballads"--

     "Would I had drunk the water cleare
         When I had drunk the wine,
     Rather than any shepherd's brat
         Should be a lady of mine.
     Would I had drunk the puddle foule
         When I had drunk the ale," etc.

The burden or chorus, "Blow away," etc., occurs also in the ballad of
"The Baffled Knight."

26. THE HEARTY GOOD FELLOW. Taken down, words and music, from
Robert Hard. This ballad is found on a Broadside by Pitts, entitled
"Adventures of a Penny." The first verse there runs--

     "Long time I've travelled the North Country
     Seeking for good company.
     Good company I always could find,
     But none was pleasing to my mind.
               Sing whack, fal de ral, etc.,
                   I had one Penny."

The rest is very much the same as our version. I also heard it sung
by a worker at the Aller Potteries, near Newton Abbot. Mr. Kidson has
obtained a traditional version in Yorkshire, and Mr. C. Sharp one in
Somersetshire from Eliza Hutchins of Langport. As the accent came
wrong in the version we received from Hard, we have adopted that as
given by Eliza Hutchins.

27. THE BONNY BUNCH OF ROSES. Of this we have taken down a great
number of versions. The melody is always the same. The youth in the
printed Broadside copies is always Napoleon Bonaparte. History does
not agree with what is said of the hero in the song. It is almost
certainly an anti-Jacobite production, adapted to Napoleon, with an
additional verse relative to Moscow. In the Broadside versions the
song is given "To the tune of the Bunch of Roses, O!" indicating that
there was an earlier ballad of the same nature.

This was a favourite fo'castle song in the middle of the nineteenth
century. There is a version of it in Christie's "Traditional
Ballads." One has also been recovered by Mr. Kidson in Yorkshire. The
song was such a favourite that a public-house near Wakefield bears
"The Bonny Bunch of Roses, O!" as its sign.

28. THE LAST OF THE SINGERS. The melody taken down from William
Huggins, mason, of Lydford, who died in March 1889. He had been
zealously engaged that winter going about among his ancient musical
friends collecting old songs for me, when he caught a chill and died.
The words he gave were those of the ballad, "The Little Girl down
the Lane," and were of no merit. I have therefore discarded them and
written fresh words, and dedicate them to the memory of poor old Will.

29. THE TYTHE PIG. Words and air taken from Robert Hard. Sung also
by J. Helmore. The song appears on Broadsides by Disley, Jackson of
Birmingham, Harkness of Preston, Catnach, and others. There are ten
verses in the original. I have cut them down to seven.

30. OLD WICHET. Taken from Thomas Darke of Whitstone. He had learned
it in 1835 from a fellow labourer. Sung also by James Parsons, Samuel
Fone, and J. Woodrich. It is said to be still popular in the North
of England. A Scottish version in Herd's Collection, 1769, and in
Johnson's "Musical Museum," Edinburgh, 1787-1803, vol. v. p. 437.
"Old Wichet" is in the Roxburgh Collection, and Bell has printed it
in his "Ballads and Songs of the English Peasantry."

Dr. Arnold recast the song to a tune of his own in "Auld Robin Gray,"
1794. The Scottish version begins--

     "The good man cam hame at e'en
         And hame cam he.
     And there he saw a saddle horse
         Where nae horse should be."

Dr. Arnold begins--

     "'Twas on Christmas day, my father he did wed,
     Three months after that, my mother was brought to bed."

In the original English song the final line to each stanza runs--

     "Old Wichet went a cuckold out, and a cuckold he came home."

But in one version taken down--

     "When honest men went out, under a horned moon."

I have thought it advisable to modify the last line of each stanza,
and to compose a last stanza, so as to give to the song a less
objectionable character. A somewhat similar ballad exists in France,
as "Marianne," in Lemoine, "Chansons du Limousin," Limoges, 1890;
in Daymard, "Vieux chants populaires de Quercy," Cahors, 1889; "Le
Jaloux," in Bladé, "Poésies populaires de Gascogne," 1881. But, in
fact, all these songs are the versification of an old troubadour
tale, that is given in Barbazan, "Fabliaux et contes des poètes
François xi.-xiv. siècles," as the "Chevalier à la robe vermeille,"
t. iii. p. 296. Alphonse Daudet, in "Numa Roumestan," introduces a
great portion of the ballad. He says, "C'est sur un air grave comme
du plain-chant." In the midst of the song, the person reciting it
breaks off, and transported by enthusiasm exclaims: "Ça, voyez-vous,
mes enfants, c'est _bo_ (beau) comme du Shakespeare."

31. JAN'S COURTSHIP. Words and air from Mr. R. Rowe, Longabrook,
Milton Abbot. Another set, slightly different, from Mr. Crossing;
another, practically identical, from Mr. Chowen, Brentor. As "Robin's
Courtship," the song was recovered by Mr. E.T. Wedmore of Bristol, in
Somersetshire. It has also been noted in the same county by Mr. Sharp
as "William the Rose," sung to the tune of "Lillibulero." It is found
in "The Universal Songster," _circ._ 1830, as "Poor Bob." In the
"Roxburgh Ballads," vi. pp. 216-7, is what is probably the earliest
form--"Come hither my dutiful son, and take counsel of me." This
was sung to the air "Grim King of the Ghosts." Another version is
referred to in the "Beggars' Opera," Act III. Sc. viii., "Now Roger
I'll tell thee, because thou'rt my son."

Our tune is rugged, and Somersetshire in character. It is in the
Æolian mode.

32. THE DROWNED LOVER. Taken down from James Parsons. This is a
very early song. It first appears as "Captain Digby's Farewell," in
the "Roxburgh Ballads," iv. p. 393, printed in 1671. In Playford's
"Choice Ayres," 1676, i. p. 10, it was set to music by Mr. Robert
Smith. Then it came to be applied to the death of the Earl of
Sandwich, after the action in Sole Bay, 1673. A black letter ballad,
date _circ._ 1676, is headed, "To the tune of the Earl of Sandwich's
Farewell." The original song consisted of three stanzas only; it
became gradually enlarged and somewhat altered, and finally Sam
Cowell composed a burlesque on it, which has served more or less to
corrupt the current versions of the old song, printed on Broadsides
by Catnach, Harkness, and others.

The black letter ballad of 1673 begins--

     "One morning I walked by myself on the shoar
     When the Tempest did cry and the Waves they did roar,
     Yet the music of the Winds and the Waters was drownd
     By the pitiful cry, and the sorrowful sound,
         Oh! Ah! Ah! Ah! my Love's dead.
               There is not a bell
               But a Triton's shell,
         To ring, to ring, to ring my Love's knell."

"Colonel Digby's Lament," 1671, begins--

     "I'll go to my Love, where he lies in the Deep,
     And in my Embrace, my dearest shall sleep.
     When we wake, the kind Dolphins together shall throng,
     And in chariots of shells shall draw us along.
         Ah! Ah! My Love is dead.
             There was not a bell, but a Triton's shell,
             To ring, to ring out his knell."

A second version of the melody, but slightly varied from that we
give, was sent us by Mr. H. Whitfeld of Plymouth, as sung by his
father. Our air is entirely different from that given by Playford,
and is probably the older melody, which was not displaced by the
composition of Mr. R. Smith. The song is sung to the same melody, but
slightly varied, in Ireland.

33. CHILDE THE HUNTER. Words taken in a fragmentary form from Jonas
Coaker. He had used up the material of the ballad, incorporating
it into a "poem" he had composed on Dartmoor, and vastly preferred
his own doggerel to what was traditional. The Æolian melody given
is that to which the Misses Phillips, who were born and reared at
Shaw, on Dartmoor, informed me that they had heard the ballad sung
about 1830. We also obtained this air to "Cold blows the wind." It is
unquestionably an early harp tune, not later than the reign of Henry
VII. For the story of Childe of Plymstock, see Murray's "Handbook of
Devon," ed. 1887, p. 208; more fully and critically in W. Crossing's
"Ancient Crosses of Dartmoor," 1887, p. 51.

34. THE COTTAGE THATCHED WITH STRAW. Taken down, words and melody,
from John Watts, quarryman, Alder, Thrushleton. This is one of
the best known and, next to "Widdecombe Fair," most favourite
songs of the Devon peasantry. Mr. Kidson has noted the song from a
Worcestershire man. So far we have not been able to trace either
words or melody, though neither can be earlier than the beginning
of the nineteenth century, and the song has all the character of a
published composition, and no spontaneous composition of a peasant.

35. CICELY SWEET. Words and air sent me by J.S. Hurrell, Esq.,
Kingsbridge, who had learned them in the middle of last century
from Mr. A. Holoran, a Devonshire schoolmaster. It has already been
published as "Sylvia Sweet" in Dale's "Collection," _circ._ 1790. Two
verses are given by Halliwell as traditional in his "Nursery Rhymes,"
4th ed., 1846, p. 223.

36. A SWEET, PRETTY MAIDEN. Melody taken down from James Parsons. The
words of his ballad were interesting and poetical, but did not fit
the tune. It began--

     "A maiden sweet went forth in May,
       Nor sheet nor clout she bare,
     She went abroad all on the day
       To breathe the fresh spring air.
     Before that she came back again
     The maiden bore a pretty son,
       And she roll'd it all up in her apron."

The theme is the same as "She roun't in her apron" in Johnson's
"Musical Museum," v. p. 437; and as it was quite impossible for us to
print it, I have set to the air another song.

37. THE WHITE COCKADE. Words and tune from Edmund Fry. The words
of this ballad are often mixed up with those of "It was one summer
morning, as I went o'er the grass." The song used to be well known
in Lancashire and Yorkshire. Several versions are given in Kidson's
"Traditional Tunes." As we heard the song, the cockade was described
as green, but there never was a green cockade. I have somewhat
altered the words. The Jacobite song of the "White Cockade" is
totally distinct. A Barnstaple ware punch-bowl with cover I have seen
in the parish of Altarnon, Cornwall, has on the cover the figure of
a piper with his dog, and the inscription, "Piper, play us the White
Cockade." This can hardly refer to the Scottish song and tune.

In "Stray Garlands," B.M. (71621, a, b), is "The Blue Cockade," but
this is a fusion of the two ballads.

38. THE SAILOR'S FAREWELL. Words and music from J. Helmore. A
Broadside version by Williams of Portsea, Wright of Birmingham, B.M.
(1876, c 2). As Helmore and his wife sang the verses alternately, we
have so arranged it.

39. A MAIDEN SAT A-WEEPING. Words and melody from James Parsons.
Again, from Will Aggett, Chagford, identically the same. In our
opinion a delicately beautiful song. The tune probably of the
sixteenth century.

40. THE BLUE KERCHIEF. Words and melody from John Woodrich, locally
known as "Ginger Jack." The words have appeared, with slight
variations, on Broadsides in ten verses. Catnach issued a parody on
it, "The Bonny Blue Jacket." In Dr. Barrett's "English Folk-Songs,"
he uses this tune for "Paul Jones."

41. COME TO MY WINDOW. This is a very early song, and the melody is
found substantially the same from the time of Queen Elizabeth.

In Beaumont and Fletcher's "Knight of the Burning Pestle," printed in
1613 and again in 1635, the merchant sings snatches of the song--

     "Go from my window, love, go;
     Go from my window, my dear;
             The wind and the rain
             Will drive you back again,
         You can not be lodged here.

     "Begone, begone, my Juggy, my Puggy,
     Begone, my love, my dear!
             The weather is warm,
             'Twill do thee no harm,
         Thou canst not be lodged here."--Act III.

In Fletcher's "Monsieur Thomas," 1639, a maid sings--

     "Come to my window, love, come, come, come!
     Come to my window, my dear:
             The wind and the rain
             Shall trouble thee again,
         But thou shalt be lodged here."--Act III. Sc. iii.

In Fletcher's "The Woman's Prize," 1640, Jaques says--

     "A moral, sir; the ballad will express it:
             The wind and the rain
             Have turn'd you back again,
         And you cannot be lodged there."--Act I. Sc. iii.

It is evident that this ballad was very familiar in the latter part
of the 16th century, and we find that on March 4, 1587-8, John Wolfe
had a licence to print a ballad, entitled "Goe from my Window." It
was one of those early songs parodied in "Ane compendious booke of
Godly and Spirituall Songs," Edinburgh, 1590. This begins--

     "Quho (who) is at my windo, who, who?
       Goe from my windo; goe, goe.
     Quha calls there, so like a strangere?
       Goe from my windo, goe!"

At the end of Heywood's "Rape of Lucrece," 1638, is--

     "Begone, begone, my Willie, my Billie,
       Begone, begone, my deere;
     The weather is warm, 'twill doe thee no harm,
       Thou canst not be lodged here."

And in this form it appears in "Wit and Drollery," 1661, p. 25.

In "Pills to Purge Melancholy," 1719, iv. 44, is another version of
the song, beginning, "Arise arise, my juggy, my puggy." The tune
is found in what is erroneously called Queen Elizabeth's "Virginal
Book," and in "A New Book of Tablature," 1596; and in Morley's
"First Book of Concert Lessons," 1599; and in Robinson's "Schoole of
Musick," 1603. In the "Dancing Master," from 1650 to 1680, the tune
is given under the title of "The New Exchange, or Durham Stable," but
altered into 6-4 time to fit it for dancing.

The tune in its original form may be seen in Chappell, i. p. 141.

Chappell has also given a traditional form of the air as obtained at
Norwich. Dr. Barrett has given another in his "English Folk-Songs,"
No. 46, but without saying where he picked it up.

We obtained ours from John Woodrich; he heard it in an ale-house near
Bideford in 1864, from an old man, who recited a tale, in which the
song comes in in snatches. He had been soaked by the rain, and he
told the tale as he dried himself by the kitchen fire. The story is
this--

Two men courted a pretty maid; one was rich, the other poor; and the
rich man was old, but she loved the young poor man. Her father, in
spite of her tears, forced her to marry the rich man; but her other
suitor came under her window and tapped, and when the husband was
away she admitted him. So passed a twelvemonth, and she had a little
child. Then, one night, the lover came under the window, thinking her
goodman was from home. With his tapping the husband awoke, and asked
what the sound was. She said that an ivy leaf, fluttered by the wind,
struck the pane.

But fearing lest the lover should continue to tap, she began to sing,
as she rocked the cradle--

     "Begone, begone, my Willie, my Billy,
       Begone my love and my dear.
             O the wind is in the west
             And the cuckoo's in his nest,
         And you cannot have a lodging here."

Again the lover tapped, and the husband asked what that meant. She
said that a bat had flown against the window. Then she sang--

     "Begone, begone, my Willie, my Billy,
       Begone, my love and my dear.
             O the weather it is warm
             And it cannot do thee harm,
         And thou canst not have a lodging here."

Then the lover called, and the husband asked what that was. She said
it was the hooting of an owl; and then she sang--

     "Begone, begone, my Willie, my Billy,
       Begone my love and my dear.
             O the wind and the rain
             Have brought him back again,
         But thou canst not have a lodging here."

Again the lover rapped; then she sprang out of bed, threw abroad the
casement, and sang--

     "Begone, begone, my Willy, you silly,
       Begone, my Fool and my Dear.
             O the Devil's in the man,
             And he cannot understan',
         That to-night he cannot have a lodging here."

This is almost certainly the original framework to which these
snatches of song belong. But there was another version of the story
in a ballad entitled "The Secret Lover, or the Jealous Father
beguil'd, to a West Country tune, or Alack! for my love and I must
dye," printed by P. Brooksby, between 1672 and 1682, given by Mr.
Ebsworth in the "Roxburgh Ballads," vi. p. 205. This begins--

     "A dainty spruce young Gallant, that lived in the West,
     He courted a young Lady, and real love professt,
     And coming one night to her, his mind he thus exprest--
         And sing, Go from my window, love, go!

     "'What, is my love a sleeping? or is my love awake?'
     'Who knocketh at the window, who knocketh there so late?'
     'It is your true love, Lady, that for your sake doth wait.'
         And sing, Go from my window, love, go!"

Here the father, and not the husband, is the person who is
troublesome to the lovers.

That this is an adaptation, and not the original form of the story,
is obvious from the line--

     "And the cuckoo's in his nest,"

a play on the word cuckold.

A still later version, _circ._ 1770, is given by Ebsworth, "Roxburgh
Ballads," vi. p. 205.

Messrs. Moffat and Kidson have given the song in the "Minstrelsy of
England," N.D., but 1903, p. 24. So also Dr. Barrett in his
"English Folk-Songs," No. 26. I have recast the words. The song may
derive from a tale used by Boccaccio in his "Decameron," vii. 1.

42. TOMMY A LYNN. This song is alluded to in the "Complaynt of
Scotland," 1549; it is probably the "Ballett of Tomalin," licensed
to be printed in 1557-8. A snatch of it occurs in Wager's play: "The
longer thou livest the more fool thou art," _circ._ 1560--

     "Tom a Lin and his wife and his wife's mother
     They got over the bridge all three together.
     The bridge was broken, and they fell in,
     The Devill go with you all, quoth Tom a Lin."

It was printed in Ritson's "North Country Chorister," Durham, 1802;
and it occurs in "The Distracted Sailor's Garland," B.M. (11,621, c
3). "Bryan o' Lynn was a gentleman born," as sung by "Mr. Purcell's
celebrated Irish vocalists," is in the "Dublin Comic Songster,"
Dublin, 1841. Halliwell gives the song in his "Popular Rhymes," 1849,
p. 271, and one verse in his "Nursery Rhymes," No. 61.

Mr. J. Phillips, who founded the Aller Vale potteries, in a lecture
on the condition of Dartmoor in 1837, says: "For roughing it on
the moor, warm waterproof coats were made by using a sheep's skin,
the wool on the inside. Warm caps of rabbit skin were common, with
lappets over the ears. An old rhyme sung by the boys was--

     "Old Harry Trewin, no breeches to wear,
     He stole a ram's skin to make a new pair.
     The shiny side out and the woolly side in,
     And thus doth go old Harry Trewin."

We have taken down the song twice from Thomas Dart and from James
Parsons. What "A Bone of my stover" signifies I am unable to say.

43. THE GREEN BUSHES. Words and melody taken down from Robert Hard.
Another sent me by Mr. Crossing, heard by him on Dartmoor from
a labouring man in 1869. The same as this taken down from James
Parsons. This latter sent by me to Miss Broadwood, who has published
it in her "County Songs," p. 170. In Buckstone's play of "The Green
Bushes," 1845, Nelly O'Neil sings snatches of this song, one verse,
"I'll buy you fine petticoats," etc., in Act 1., and that and the
following verse in Act III. Nowhere is the complete ballad given.
That, however, owing to the popularity of the drama, was published
soon after as a "popular Irish ballad sung by Mrs. FitzWilliam."
Later it was attributed to the husband of that lady, Mr. E.F.
FitzWilliam, but it was not published in his lifetime. The words are
substantially old, in this form are a softening down of an earlier
ballad which has its analogue in Scotland, "My daddie is a cankered
carle," each verse of which ends--

     "For he's low down, he's in the broom
           That's waiting for me."

The English form is "Whitsun Monday," an early copy of which is in
one of the collections in the British Museum, date about 1760. Each
verse ends--

     "And 'tis low down in the broom
           She's waiting there for me."

Broadsides by Disley and Such. In a collection of early ballad books
in the British Museum is "The Lady's Book of Pleasure," printed in
Cow Lane, _circ._ 1760. This contains a ballad that begins--

     "As I was a walking one morning in May,
     I heard a young damsel to sigh and to say,
     My love is gone from me, and showed me foul play,
     It was down in the meadow, among the Green Hay."

Another, with Green Bushes in place of Green Hay, published by Hodges
of Seven Dials, B.M. (1875, b 19). For other versions, see Kidson's
"Traditional Tunes"; Joyce's "Ancient Irish Music," 1873; Petrie's
"Ancient Music of Ireland," 1855. The Irish air is not the same as
ours.

44. THE BROKEN TOKEN. Words and melody from Robert Hard. Broadside
forms as "The Brisk Young Sailor," or as "Fair Phoebe"; as "The
Dark Eyed Sailor," by Such, and Wheeler of Manchester; and as "The
Sailor's Return," by Catnach. A version is published in Christie's
"Traditional Ballads," and Mr. Kidson obtained it in Yorkshire to a
tune different from ours. The same as ours was noted down by Mr. S.
Reay about 1830-5 from a ballad singer at Durham.

45. THE MOLE CATCHER. Taken down from J. Hockin, South Brent, by H.
Fleetwood Sheppard in 1888. The original words were very gross, and
I did not note them. In the British Museum is an early Garland, and
in the list of contents on the cover is "The Mole Catcher," but the
song has been torn out, probably for the same reason that prevented
me from taking it down. All I copied was the beginning of the song. I
have supplemented this with fresh words.

46. THE KEENLY LODE. Mr. Bussell and I spent a week in 1894 at the
Lugger Inn, Fowey, collecting songs. We met there one day an old
miner, who asked us if we knew "The Keenly Lode," and on our saying
that we did not, he gave us a long song on mining, that, however,
lacked point. I have therefore re-composed the song. The air is
that employed for "The Crocodile," an extravagant ballad, which has
been published by Miss Broadwood in her "County Songs." Her tune is
practically the same as ours, but there are some differences. "The
Crocodile" is a very popular ballad among old song-men, but no one
would care to sing it in a drawing-room or at a concert, because it
is vastly silly.

"A Keenly Lode" is a lode that promises well. A "Bâll" is a mine in
Cornish. In Cornwall every old man is termed "Uncle."

We have taken down "The Meat Pie" to the same air.

47. MAY DAY CAROL. Melody and words noted down a good many years
ago by J.S. Cayzer, Esq. It was sung, till of late years, in my
neighbourhood, where a bunch of flowers at the end of a stick was
carried about by children. It was customary in England for a lover
on May morning to take a green bough to the house of the beloved. If
she opened the door and took it in, this was a token of acceptance.
At the Puritan epoch this custom was altered, and the song was
converted into a carol with a moral to it, see "Notes and Queries,"
Third Series, ix. p. 380; Hone's "Every Day Book," 1826, i. p. 567;
Chambers' "Book of Days," i. p. 578. Herrick refers to the custom of
youths bringing their May bushes to the maids of their choice:--

     "A deale of youth ere this is come
     Back, and with white thorn laden home,
     Some have dispatched their cakes and cream,
     Before that we have left to dream."

The melody is a very early one in the Dorian mode, and resembles that
of the carol, "The Moon shines bright," Broadwood's "County Songs,"
p. 108. The carol is still sung in Cornwall.

48. THE LOVERS' TASKS. This very curious song belongs, as I was
told, in Cornwall, to a sort of play that was wont to be performed
in farmhouses at Christmas. One performer, a male, left the room,
and entered again singing the first part. A girl, seated on a chair,
responded with the second part. The story was this. She had been
engaged to a young man who died. His ghost returned to claim her. She
demurred to this, and he said that he would waive his claim if she
could perform a series of tasks he set her. To this she responded
that he must, in the first place, accomplish a set of impossible
tasks she would set him. Thus was he baffled.

"In all stories of this kind," says Professor Child, "the person
upon whom a task is imposed stands acquitted if another of no less
difficulty is devised which must be performed first."

This ballad and dramatic scene corresponds with that in "Cold blows
the wind" (No. 6). There, in the original, the ghost desires to draw
the girl underground, when she is seated on his grave. She objects,
and he sets her a task--

     "Go fetch me a light from dungeon deep,
       Wring water from a stone,
     And likewise milk from a maiden's breast,
       That never babe had none."

She answers the requirement--

     "She stroke a light from out a flint,
       An icebell squeezed she,
     And likewise milk from a Johnnis' wort,
       And so she did all three."

Icebell is icicle. By this means she was quit. In the version I have
given I have altered this to suit the song for modern singing.

In "The Elfin Knight," Child's "British Ballads," No. 2, an elf
appears to the damsel and sets her tasks. If she cannot accomplish
these, she must accompany him to the elf world. Here we have a
substitution of a fairy for a ghost.

In an Ulster Broadside in the British Museum (1162, k 5) we have
a later substitution. A low-born gamekeeper gets a damsel of high
degree into his power, and will not release her unless she can solve
a series of riddles. This she does, and so makes her escape.

Of the Northumbrian ballad, "Lay the Bent to the Bonny Broom," Child,
No. 1, there are two versions. In one given by Miss Mason, "Nursery
Rhymes and Country Songs," a stranger comes to the door of a house
where are three sisters, and demands that one shall follow him or
answer a series of riddles. Then ensues a contest of wit, and the
girl escapes the obligation of following the mysterious stranger.
Who he is is not ascertained. In the other version it is different;
he is a knight, and he offers to marry the girl who can solve his
riddles. The youngest sister effects this, so he marries her. It is
the same in the corresponding Cornish ballad of "Genefer Gentle and
Rosemarie," originally given by Gilbert in his "Cornish Christmas
Carols," 2nd ed., p. 65, and reprinted by Child.

To the same category belongs the song, "Go no more a-rushing, Maids,
in May," that we have taken down from several singers, and which is
given as well by Miss Mason, and by Chappell, i. p. 158, where the
task is to solve riddles--

     "I'll give you a chicken that has no bone,
     I'll give you a cherry without a stone,
     I'll give you a ring that has no rim,
     I'll give you an oak that has no limb."

The solution is--

     "When the chicken is in the egg it has no bone,
     When the cherry is in bloom it has no stone,
     When the ring is a-melting it has no rim,
     When the oak is in the acorn it has no limb."

But the story about the setting of the puzzle has fallen away.

We did obtain a ballad in Cornwall about the ghost visiting the
damsel and demanding that she should keep her engagement, but the
metre was not the same as that of the "Lovers' Tasks."

Apparently at some remote period a maiden who was pledged to a man
was held to belong to him after he was dead, and to be obliged to
follow her lover into the world of spirits, unless she could evade
the obligation by some clever contrivance. When this idea fell away,
either an elf was substituted or a man of low birth, or else the
whole story was dropped; or, again, it was so altered that a knight
was put in the place of the ghost, and it became the privilege of the
shrewd girl who could answer the riddles to be taken as his wife.

The setting of hard tasks occurs in German folk-tales, as in
"Rumpelstiltskin," where the girl has to spin straw into gold.

In the "Gesta Romanorum," ed. Osterley, p. 374, one of the most
popular collections of stories in the Middle Ages, is a corrupt
reminiscence of the tale. A king delayed to take a wife till he could
find one sagacious enough to make him a shirt without seam out of a
scrap of linen three inches square. She retorts that she will do this
when he sends her a vessel in which she can do the work. Jacques de
Voragine wrote his "Golden Legend" in or about 1260. In that he tells
this tale. A bishop was about to succumb to the blandishments of the
devil in female form, when a pilgrim arrived. Either the damsel or
the palmer must leave, and which it should be was to be determined by
the solution of riddles. The pilgrim solved two. Then the fiend in
female form asked: "How far is it from heaven to earth?" "That you
know best, for you fell the whole distance," replied the palmer, and
the fiend vanished. Then the pilgrim revealed himself as St. Andrew,
to whom the bishop had a special devotion.

The classic tale of [OE]dipus and the Sphinx will be remembered in
connection with delivery from death by solving riddles. In Norse
mythology we have the contest in conundrums between Odin and the
giant Vafthrudnir. The Rabbis tell of the Queen of Sheba proving
Solomon with hard questions, which are riddles.

The historians of Tyre, as Josephus informs us, recorded that an
interchange of riddles went on constantly between Solomon and Hiram,
each being under an engagement to pay a forfeit of money for every
riddle that he could not solve. Solomon got the best of Hiram, till
Hiram set a Tyrian boy to work, who both solved the riddles of
Solomon, and set others which Solomon could not answer. We have a
later version of this story in the ballad of King John and the Abbot
of Canterbury, who, unable to solve the king's riddles, set his
cowherd to do this, and he accomplished it successfully.

We took down the ballad and air from Philip Symonds of Jacobstow,
Cornwall, also from John Hext, Two Bridges, and from James Dyer of
Mawgan. The burden, "And every grove rings with a merry antine," is
curious; _antine_ is antienne--anthem. In "Gammer Gurton's Garland,"
1783, the burden is "Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme." In one of
Motherwell's MSS. it stands, "Every rose grows merry wi' thyme."
These are attempts made to give sense where the meaning of the
original word was lost.

In _Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 83, is a version from Sussex:
"Sing Ivy, Sing Ivy."

49. LULLABY. Noted by me from recollection, as sung by a nurse, Anne
Bickle of Bratton Clovelly, about 1842. James Olver of Launceston
also knew the tune. The words I have re-composed to the best of my
ability.

50. THE GIPSY COUNTESS. The melody of the first part from James
Parsons, that of the second from John Woodrich. Versions also from
Peter Cheriton, shoemaker, Oakford, near Tiverton; William Setter
and George Kerswell, Two Bridges, Dartmoor. Robert Browning composed
on this theme his poem, "The Flight of the Duchess," having heard
a beggar woman sing the ballad. Mrs. Gibbons told me she heard the
whole ballad sung by her nurse in Cornwall, about 1830.

The Scottish version of the ballad is that of "Johnny Faa," in Allan
Ramsay's "Tea-Table Miscellany," 1724, from which it passed into
all collections of Scottish songs. Allan Ramsay's version turns on
a story--utterly unhistorical--that Lady Jean Hamilton, married to
the grim Covenanter, John, Earl of Cassilis, fell in love with, and
eloped with, Sir John Faa of Dunbar, who came to the castle disguised
as a gipsy along with some others. She was pursued, and Faa and his
companions were hung. No such an event took place. The Scotch are
wont to take an old ballad, give it local habitation and name, and so
make it out to be purely Scottish. My impression is that this was an
old English ballad dealt with by Ramsay. It may have been so adapted
for political purposes, as a libel on Lady Cassilis, who was the
mother of Bishop Burnet's wife. An Irish form of the ballad in the
British Museum (1162, k 6). For a full account of the "Johnny Faa"
ballad, see Child's "English and Scottish Ballads," No. 200. He is of
opinion that the English ballad is taken from the Scottish. I think
the reverse is the case. Parsons sang right through without division
of parts. I have made the division, so as to allow of the use of both
airs; but actually the second is a modern corruption of the first,
and is interesting as showing how completely a melody may undergo
transformation. Mr. Sharp has given a Somersetshire version of the
ballad in his "Folk Songs from Somerset," No. 9.

51. THE GREY MARE. The melody and a fragment of the song were taken
down from J. Hockin, South Brent, and again from James Olver. Neither
could recall all the words. There are two forms of the ballad on
Broadsides. Both are printed by Mr. Kidson in his "Traditional
Tunes." Mr. Sheppard recast the words.

52. THE WRECK OFF SCILLY. Words and melody from James Parsons. The
ballad as sung consisted of seven verses. Broadside by Catnach. The
last verse in this is nonsense, and I have re-written this verse.
Under the title "The Rocks of Scilly," it occurs, in twenty-two
verses, in "The Sailor's Tragedy," Glasgow, 1802.

53. HENRY MARTYN. Words and melody from Roger Luxton, Halwell. Again,
from Matthew Baker, James Parsons, and from a shepherd on Dartmoor.
The versions slightly differed, as far as words went. In one, Henry
Martyn receives his death-wound; in another, it is the king's ship
that is sunk by the pirate.

Mr. Kidson has printed two versions of the song in his "Traditional
Tunes," from Yorkshire sources. Miss Broadwood has also collected it,
_Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 162, in Sussex.

Henry Martyn is a corruption of Andrew Barton. In 1476, a Portuguese
squadron seized a richly laden ship, commanded by John Barton, in
consequence of which letters of reprisal were granted by James IV.
to the three sons, Andrew, Robert, and John, and these were renewed
in 1506. Hall, in his "Chronicle," under 1511, says that King Henry
VIII. being at Leicester, tidings reached him that Andrew Barton so
stopped the king's ports that the merchant vessels could not pass
out, and he seized their goods, pretending that they were Portuguese.
Sir Edward Howard, Lord High Admiral, and Sir Thomas Howard were sent
against him. Their two ships were separated, but a fight ensued, in
which Andrew was wounded, and his vessel, the _Lion_, was taken. He
died of his wounds.

The ballad was re-composed in the reign of James I., and this is
published in Percy's "Relicks" and in Evans' "Old Ballads." For an
account of Sir Andrew Barton, see Child's "English and Scottish
Ballads," No. 167. The ballad in full in Percy's MS. book is in
sixty-four stanzas. Our form of the ballad is probably earlier, but
it is incomplete. I have added the last verse to give a finish to the
story. The tune is in the Æolian mode.

54. PLYMOUTH SOUND. Melody taken down from Roger Luxton to a song of
this name. There are three songs that go by the title of "Plymouth
Sound" on Broadsides, by Keys, of Devonport, and by Such; but all are
coarse and undesirable. I have therefore written fresh words to this
delicious air.

55. THE FOX. In the early part of last century this song was sung at
all harvest suppers in the West of England. It is known elsewhere,
but not to the same tune. A version of "The Fox" in the tenth volume
of "Notes and Queries," 1854, is spoken of as "an old Cornish Song."
In "Gammer Gurton's Garland," _circ._ 1783, is one verse of the
song. It occurs in "The Opera, or Cabinet of Song," Edinburgh, 1832.
Halliwell, in his "Nursery Rhymes," Percy Soc., 1842, gives a fuller
version than ours. He begins--

     "The fox and his wife they had a great strife,
     They never eat mustard in all their life;
     They eat their meat without fork or knife,
         And loved to be picking a bone, e-no!"

In a collection of songs in the British Museum is the ballad on a
Broadside by Harkness of Birmingham. It begins--

     "The fox went out of a moon-shiny night,
     When the moon and the stars they shined so bright;
     I hope, said the Fox, we'll have a good night,
             When we go to yonder town, O!
                 Mogga, mogga, Reynard.
         The wheel it goes round, and we'll tally-ho th' hounds,
         And I wish I was through the town, O!"

The tune we give was taken down from James Parsons. There were two
other airs to which it was sung in other parts of England. These I
give--

[Music: The Fox, II.]

[Music: III.]

56. FURZE BLOOM. The melody from Roger Luxton to the words of the
ballad, "Gosport Beach," which could not possibly be inserted here. I
have accordingly written fresh words to it, embodying the folk-saying
in Devon and Cornwall--

     "When the Furze is out of bloom,
     Then Love is out of tune."

57. THE OXEN PLOUGHING. This song was known throughout Devon and
Cornwall at the beginning of the 19th century. It went out of use
along with the oxen at the plough. We found every old singer had
heard it in his boyhood, but none could recall more than snatches
of the tune and some of the words. We were for three years on its
traces, always disappointed. Then we heard that there was an old
man at Liskeard who could sing the song through. Mr. Sheppard and
I hastened thither, to find that he had been speechless for three
days, and that his death was hourly expected. One day I found an
old white-headed and white-bearded man cutting ferns in the hedges
at Trebartha in Cornwall. His name was Adam Landry. We got into
conversation. I had heard he was a singer, and I asked after this
especial song. He knew it. I sat down among the cut fern and learned
it from him, singing it over and over till I had it by heart, and
then drove home eighteen miles, warbling it the whole way, and went
to my piano and fixed it. Later we found a labouring man, Joseph
Dyer, at Mawgan-in-Pyder, who could sing the song through.

Mr. Sharp has also taken this down note for note in North Devon from
an old farmer, Mr. Lake of Worlington, who remembered the use of oxen
ploughing.

A very similar folk-song is found in France, with its refrain, naming
the oxen--

     "Aronda, Vironda,
     Charbonné, Maréchaô,
         Motet et Roget,
         Mortaigne et Chollet,
     Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! mon mignon,
     He! he! he! he! he! he! mon valet."

See George Sand's account of the song in "Le mare au diable," c. 2;
Tiersot, _op. cit._, p. 157.

58. FLORA, THE LILY OF THE WEST. Two melodies have been noted down to
this ballad, one from Matthew Baker, the old cripple on Lew Down, the
other from Samuel Fone. The first is identical with one obtained in
Yorkshire by Mr. Kidson.

The words are on Broadsheets by Such, Fortey, Barr of Leeds, etc.

In the original the lover betrayed by Flora stabs to the heart the
"lord of high degree" who has supplanted him--

     "I walked up to my rival with a dagger in my hand,
     And seized him from my false love, and bid him boldly stand;
     Then, mad with desperation, I swore I'd pierce his breast,
     And I was betrayed by Flora, the Lily of the West."

He is tried for murder, but "a flaw was in the indictment found," and
he escapes the gallows. And the ballad winds up--

     "Although she swore my life away, she still disturbs my rest,
     I must ramble for my Flora, the Lily of the West."

I have thought it well to cut out the murder and the trial.

The ballad has clearly an Irish origin, what air is used for it in
Ireland I am unable to say. It has been generally accepted that the
ending of a phrase on the same three notes is characteristic of Irish
music. It is not more so than of English folk airs. "Flora, the
Lily of the West" was wont to be sung annually at the Revel at St.
Breward's on the Bodmin Moors, and can be traced back there to 1839.
There Henry Hawken, sexton at Michaelstow, hard by, acquired it, and
from him the first melody was taken down as well by the Rev. W.J.
Wyon, vicar of St. Issey, in 1899.

59. THE SIMPLE PLOUGHBOY. This charming ballad was taken down, words
and music, from J. Masters, Bradstone. The Broadside versions that
were published by Fortey, Hodges, Taylor of Spitalfields, Ringham of
Lincoln, and Pratt of Birmingham, are all very corrupt. The version
of old Masters is given exactly as he sang it, and it is but one
instance out of many of the superiority of the ballads handed down
traditionally in the country by unlettered men, to those picked up
from the ballad-mongers employed by the Broadside publishers.

A version of the song, "It's of a Pretty Ploughboy," is given in the
_Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 132, as taken down in Sussex. The
words are very corrupt, and they closely resemble those on Broadsides.

60. FAIR LADY PITY ME. Taken down from a labouring man at Exbourne.
The melody is ancient and dates from the Tudor period. The words are
a fragment from "The Noble Lord's Cruelty," "Roxburgh Ballads," ed.
Ebsworth, vi. 681-3. Its date is before 1624. But that was to be
sung to the tune, "Dainty come Thou to Me," which is in Chappell,
ii. p. 517. A ballad, "The Four Wonders of the Land," printed by P.
Brocksby, 1672-95, was set to the tune, "Dear Love Regard My Grief,"
which are the initial words of this song, and shows that already the
long ballad had been broken up.

This song has already been given, arranged by Dr. Bussell, who took
it down, in "English Minstrelsie," iv. p. 84.

61. THE PAINFUL PLOUGH. Words and melody from Roger Huggins, mason,
Lydford. It is in reality a much longer song. Under the title of "The
Ploughman's Glory" it runs to 25 verses. Bell gives 9 in his "Ballads
of the English Peasantry." It is found on Broadsides. In the original
it consists of a contention between a ploughman and a gardener as
to which exercises the noblest profession. Our air is not the same
as that to which the song is sung in the Midlands and south-east of
England. Dr. Barrett gives the song in his "English Folk-Songs," No.
3, to a North Country air.

62. AT THE SETTING OF THE SUN. This very curious ballad has been
taken down twice, from Samuel Fone by Mr. Sheppard, and again by
Mr. Cecil Sharp from the singing of Louie Hooper and Lucy White at
Hambridge, Somerset, to a different air. Fone had forgotten portions
of the song. The man who mistakes his true love for a swan because
she had thrown her apron over her head as a protection from the rain
is tried at the assizes for the murder--

     "In six weeks' time when the 'sizes came on,
     Young Polly appeared in the form of a swan,
     Crying Jimmy, young Jimmy, young Jimmy is clear,
     He never shall be hung for the shooting of his dear."

And he is, of course, acquitted.

In Fone's version she appears in dream to her lover as a swan, and
comforts him, but the sequel of the story he could not recall.

The ballad is found in a fragmentary condition in Kent--

     "O cursed be my uncle for lendin' of a gun.
     For I've bin' and shot my true love in the room of a swan."

And the apparition of the girl says--

     "With my apron tied over me, I 'peared like unto a swan,
     And underneath the green tree while the showers did come on."

This was heard in 1884, sung by a very old man at a harvest supper at
Haverstall Doddington, near Faversham.

The transformation of the damsel into a swan stalking into the Court
is an early feature, and possibly the ballad may be a degraded form
of a very ancient piece.

This ballad, arranged as a song with accompaniment by Mr. Ferris
Tozer, has been published by Messrs. Weeks.

Mr. Sharp has given the song to a different air in his "Folk-Songs
from Somerset," No. 16.

63. ALL JOLLY FELLOWS THAT FOLLOW THE PLOUGH. This song is very
generally known. We have picked up four variants of the tune. Miss
Broadwood gives one from Oxfordshire and one from Hampshire, but hers
lack the chorus. Mr. C. Sharp has also gathered three. He says: "I
find that almost every singer knows it, the bad singers often know
but little else. Perhaps it is for this reason that the tune is very
corrupt, the words are almost always the same."

In the second verse we have the breakfast described as consisting
of bread and cheese and stingo. In Miss Broadwood's version the
breakfast consists of cold beef and pork; the drink is not specified.

64. THE GOLDEN VANITY. Taken down, words and air, from James Oliver.
The ballad was printed as "Sir Walter Raleigh sailing in the
Lowlands, showing how the famous ship called the _Sweet Trinity_
was taken by a false galley; and how it was recovered by the craft
of a little sea-boy, who sunk the galley," by Coles, Wright, Vere,
and Conyers (1648-80). In this it is said that the ballad is to be
sung "to the tune of The Lowlands of Holland," and in it there is
ingratitude shown to the poor sea-boy of a severe character. In this
version there are fourteen verses. It begins--

     "Sir Walter Raleigh has built a ship,
           In the Netherlands.
     And it is called the _Sweet Trinity_,
     And was taken by the false Gallaly,
           Sailing in the Lowlands."

It has been reprinted in Child, No. 286, as also the earliest form of
the ballad from the Pepys Collection. By writing some of the words
as "awa'" and "couldna'," it has been turned into a Scottish ballad.
Under the form of "The Goulden Vanity," it is given with an air (of
no value) in Mrs. Gordon's "Memoirs of Christopher North," 1862, ii.
p. 317, as sung at a convivial meeting at Lord Robertson's, by Mr. P.
Fraser of Edinburgh.

We obtained the same ballad at Chagford as "The Yellow Golden Tree."
"Sir Walter Raleigh," says Mr. Ebsworth, in his introduction to the
ballad in the "Roxburgh Ballads" (v. p. 418), "never secured the
popularity, the natural affection which were frankly given to Robert
Devereux, the Earl of Essex. Raleigh was deemed arrogant, selfish,
with the airs of an upstart, insolent to superiors, unconciliating
with equals, and heartlessly indifferent to those in a lower
position. The subject of the ballad is fictitious--sheer invention,
of course. The selfishness and ingratitude displayed by Raleigh
agreed with the current estimate. He certainly had a daughter."

In the ballad in the Pepys Collection the _Sweet Trinity_, a ship
built by Sir Walter Raleigh, has been taken by a galley of a
nationality not specified. He asks whether any seaman will take the
galley and redeem his ship: the reward shall be a golden fee and his
daughter. A ship-boy volunteers and with his auger bores fifteen
holes in the galley and sinks her, and releases the _Sweet Trinity_.
Then he swims back to his ship and demands his pay. The master will
give golden fee but not his daughter. The ship-boy says, Farewell,
since you are not so good as your word.

In the stall copy of the ballad, the master refuses to take the boy
on board after he had sunk the galley, and threatens to shoot him,
and the boy is drowned. Then he is picked up, is sewed in a cow-hide
and thrown overboard.

Mr. Kidson has obtained no less than four different versions from
sailors.

A version from Sussex is in _Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 104.
Another in Miss Broadwood's "English County Songs." It is also in
Ferris Tozer's "Sailors' Songs and Chanties." The black letter ballad
of "Sir Walter Raleigh Sailing in the Lowlands low ... or the _Sweet
Trinity_" was priced in Russell Smith's catalogue, £1, 5s.

65. THE BOLD DRAGOON. Words and melody taken down by W. Crossing,
Esq., many years ago, from a labouring man on Dartmoor, now dead.
The words were very corrupt. We took down the words and tune from
Moses Cleve at Huckaby Bridge, Dartmoor. An early version of the
words as "The Jolly Trooper," in "The Lover's Garland," N.D., but of
the beginning of the 18th century. The original is too coarse for
reproduction and is lengthy. I have condensed the ballad and softened
it down. The press mark in the British Museum is 11,621, c 5.

66. TRINITY SUNDAY. Melody noted down by T.S. Cayzer, Esq., in 1849,
at Post Bridge, from a moor man. The original words were unsuitable,
a Broadside ballad of a murder.[32] I have written fresh words.

[Footnote 32: Printed on Broadside by Catnach as "Oxford City."]

In connection with this charming air, I will give Mr. Cayzer's
account of taking it down in 1849, which he has kindly extracted for
me from his diary:--"This air, together with 'As Johnny walked out'
(No. 11), I got from Dartmoor; nor shall I soon forget the occasion.
The scene was a lonely one (I think Two Bridges, but it may have been
Post Bridge). It had been raining all day. There was not a book in
the house, nor musical instrument of any kind, except two hungry pigs
and a baby that was being weaned. Towards nightfall there dropped in
several miners and shepherds, and I well remember how the appearance
of these Gentiles cheered us. We soon got up a glorious fire--such a
fire as peat only can make, and drew the benches and settles round.
By the friendly aid of sundry quarts of cyder I, before long, gained
the confidence of the whole circle, and got a song from each in
turn; and noted down two that were quite new to me: no easy matter,
considering that they were performed in a strange mixture of double
bass and falsetto. The action with which they accompanied the singing
was extremely appropriate. They always sing standing."

Many a similar evening have Mr. Sheppard, Mr. Bussell, and I spent in
like manner over the peat fire with the burly, red-faced moor men and
shepherds, standing to sing their quaint old songs, and very happy
evenings they have been.

The same melody was taken down by Miss Wyatt Edgell from an old woman
near Exeter, in 1891. The words sung to it related to the same Oxford
Tragedy, but were a version different from the stall copy.

67. THE BLUE FLAME. Melody taken down by Mr. W. Crossing, from an old
moor man, to "Rosemary Lane." Roger Luxton and James Parsons also
sang "Rosemary Lane" to the same air. The words are objectionable.
Moreover, in other parts of England, this Broadside song is always
sung to one particular air. We therefore thought it well to put to
our melody entirely fresh words.

It was a common belief in the West of England that a soul after death
appeared as a blue flame; and that a flame came from the churchyard
to the house of one doomed to die, and hovered on the doorstep till
the death-doomed expired, when the soul of the deceased was seen
returning with the other flame, also as a flame, to the churchyard.

68. STRAWBERRY FAIR. Melody taken down from James Masters. This is a
very old song. It is found with music in "Songs and Madrigals of the
15th Century," published by the Old English Plain-Song Society, 1891.
The ballad was recast "Kytt has lost her Key," which is given by
Dr. Rimbault in his "Little Book of Songs and Ballads gathered from
Ancient Music Books," 1851, p. 49. We have been forced to re-write
the words, which were very indelicate. The air was used, in or about
1835, by Beuler, a comic song writer, for "The Devil and the Hackney
Coachman"--

     "Ben was a Hackney coachman sure,
     Jarvey! Jarvey!--Here I am, your honour."

I have never found a singer who had any knowledge of Beuler's song,
but all have heard "Strawberry Fair," and some men of seventy or
eighty years of age say they learned it from their fathers.

69. THE COUNTRY FARMER'S SON. Taken down from James Woolrich, a
labourer, at Broadwood Widger. The original ballad, "The Constant
Farmer's Son," is found on a Broadside by Ross of Newcastle. I have
re-written the song. The fine, robust tune belongs to the end of the
18th century. See _Folk-Song Journal_, i. p. 160.

70. THE HOSTESS' DAUGHTER. Taken down from J. Masters, Bradstone. The
coarseness of the original words obliged me to re-write the song.

71. THE JOLLY GOSS-HAWK. Melody taken down from H. Westaway to "The
Nawden Song," which begins--

     "I went to my lady the first of May,
     A jolly Goss-hawk and his wings were grey,
     Come let us see who'll win my fair ladye--you or me."

To the 2nd of May is "a two twitty bird," then "a dushy cock," a
"four-legged pig," "five steers," "six boars," "seven cows calving,"
"eight bulls roaring," "nine cocks crowing," "ten carpenters yawing,"
"eleven shepherds sawing," "twelve old women scolding." Mr. C.
Sharp has taken it down in Somersetshire. A Scottish version in
Chambers' "Popular Rhymes of Scotland," 1842; as "The Yule Days," a
Northumbrian version; "The XII. days of Christmas," with air not like
ours, in "Northumbrian Minstrelsy," Newcastle, 1882, p. 129.

A Breton version, "Gousper ou ar Ranad" in "Chansons Populaires de
la Basse Bretagne," by Luzel, 1890, p. 94. The West of England song
has got mixed up with the "Goss Hawk," another song. See "The Fond
Mother's Garland," B.M. (11,621, c 5). A companion song to this is
"The Bonny Bird," given further on in this collection, No. 106. The
song, in Devonshire, goes by the name of "The Nawden Song."

72. THE SONG OF THE MOOR. The melody was taken down at Merrivale
Bridge, Dartmoor, from a quarryman named Nankivel, commonly known as
"Old Capul." To this air he sang a farcical ballad, "The Infant,"
quite unworthy of it. I have, accordingly, written fresh words to a
really good swinging tune.

The original began as follows--

     "O when I was an Infant, to London I did go,
     Among the French and Spaniards my gallantry to show.
     And when I reached the Eastern shore, I let my head hang down,
     I tripped over Baganells (?) and never touched the ground.
                           Fal-de-ral-de, etc.

     "So when I reached the Eastern shore, I met a giant high,
     He lookèd down upon me, and bade me pass him by.
     He challenged me to dance and sing, to whistle and to run,
     I beat him out of all his wits, and kill'd him when I'd done.

     "The people in amazement stood, to see what I had done,
     They gave me silver plate, about a fifty ton.
     I made myself a little box, about three acres square,
     I filled it to the very top, with my bright silver ware."

And so on through a string of absurdities. It is apparently a
modernised version of "The Jovial Broomman," by R. Climsall,
published by R. Harper, 1635-1642. "Roxburgh ballads," ed. Chappell,
i. p. 500.

73. ON A MAY MORNING SO EARLY. This melody belongs to the ballad "I'm
Seventeen on Sunday." This begins--

     "As I walked out one May morning,
       One May morning so early,
     O there I spied a fair pretty maid
       All on the dew so pearly.
           With a fa-la-la, with a fa-la-la,
       All on the dew so pearly.

     "O where are you going my fair pretty maid?
       O where are you going my lambie?
     Then cheerfully she answered me,
       On an errand for my mammie.

     "How old are you, my fair pretty maid?
       How old are you, my honey?
     Then cheerfully she answered me,
       I'm seventeen on Sunday."

For good reasons we could not give the words as taken down, so Mr.
Sheppard wrote fresh words to the tune. The ballad was obtained from
Roger Huggins, Lydford, and from William Bickle, Bridestowe, but
it is known and sung throughout Devon and Cornwall. The original
ballad was altered by Burns to "The Waukrife Mammy" for Johnson's
"Museum," iv. p. 210, and Allan Cuningham also arranged a song on the
same theme, as the original was objectionable. Lyle gives it in his
"Ballads," 1827, saying: "This ballad, in its original dress, at one
time, from my recollection, was not only extremely popular, but a
great favourite among the young peasantry of the West of Scotland. To
suit the times, however, we have been necessitated to throw out the
intermediate stanzas, as their freedom would not bear transcription,
whilst the second and third have been slightly altered from the
recited copy." An Irish version (re-written) to the Irish air, by
Joyce, "Ancient Irish Music," 1873, No. 17. He says: "I cannot tell
when I learned the air and words of this song, for I have known
them as long as my memory can reach back. For several reasons [the
original words] could not be presented to the reader."

Burns, when forwarding the ditty to Johnson, said of it: "I picked
up this old song and tune from a country girl in Nithsdale; I
never met with it elsewhere in Scotland." The words may be found
on Broadsheets, printed by Such and by Bebbington, Manchester. Mr.
Kidson has recovered several versions in Yorkshire, and one is given
in the _Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 92, as taken down in Sussex,
and two were in vol. ii. p. 9 noted down by Mr. Sharp in Somerset.
Our tune is in the Dorian mode.

74. THE SPOTTED COW. Words and air from James Parsons, J. Helmore, H.
Smith, and J. Woodrich. Mr. Sharp has also taken it down in N. Devon
and in Somerset.

The earliest form of the words is found in a garland printed by Angus
of Newcastle, B.M. (11,621, c 4). There are later Broadside versions.
The words also in Fairburne's "Everlasting Songster," _circ._ 1825.
Mr. Kidson gives the song in his "Traditional Tunes," p. 70, but to a
melody different from ours. About 1760 Dr. Berg set the song, recast
in a Scotch form: "As Jamie gang'd blithe his way along the banks of
Tweed," to be sung at Ranelagh. As sung, the ballad consists of four
lines in a stanza, and the two last are repeated; and it is in seven
stanzas. To shorten the ballad I have made each stanza consist of six
lines. Our tune is not that of Dr. Berg. But it is redolent of the
art-music of the 18th or early 19th century, and hardly possesses the
character of folk-made song. Still, it is very freely sung by old
people in Devon and Somerset.

75. THREE JOVIAL WELSHMEN. Taken down from "Old Capul," Nankivel,
Merrivale Bridge. The song is given in Halliwell's "Nursery Rhymes
of England," 290. It is probably a very old ballad, for in a ballad,
"Choice of Inventions," printed by F. Coles, 1646-74, in the Roxburgh
Collection (ed. Chappell, i. p. 105), is given a pot-pourri of
scraps, "several sorts of the figure three," and it begins--

     "There were three men of Gotham, as I've heard say,
     That needs would ride a hunting upon St. David's Day.
     Through all the day they hunting were, yet no sport could they see,
     Untill they spide an Owle as she sate on a tree.
     The first man said 'twas a Goose, the second man said Nay,
     The third man said 'twas a Hawke, but his Bells were falne away."

The tune to which it was to be sung was "Rock the Cradle, sweet
John," for which, see Chappell, i. p. 189.

Another, and more modern version, is that of "The Three Jovial
Huntsmen"--

     "It's of three jovial huntsmen an' a hunting they did go;
     An' they hunted, an' they hallo'd, an' they blew their horns also,"

which has been illustrated by Caldecott.

The original ballad is in "The Woody Chorister," B.M. (1162, e 2).

This is one of the ballads Mr. Incledon Johns heard sung on the
outskirts of Dartmoor in 1830, mentioned in his book, already
noticed, published in 1832.

A version, "Six Jovial Welshmen," is given in vol. i. p. 128,
_Folk-Song Journal_, from Sussex. It runs--

     "It's of six jovial Welshmen, six jovial men were they,
     And they would all a hunting ride, upon St. David's Day.
     Then fill each glass and let it pass, no sign of care betray,
     We'll drink and sing, 'Long live the King!' upon St. David's Day."

     "When crook-back'd Richard wore the crown, as regent of the land,
     No policy could pull him down, nor his proud foe withstand.
     A tribute he from them did seek, which they refused to pay,
     And in their caps they wore a leek, upon St. David's Day.
     Then fill each glass, and let it pass, etc."

This is probably a re-edition of the older song.

76. WELL MET, WELL MET, MY OWN TRUE LOVE. The words are a cento from
the lengthy ballad of the "Carpenter's Wife," which, as we have taken
it down, consists of twenty verses. The black letter Broadside, "The
Carpenter's Wife," is a peculiarly interesting ballad. It is the
story of one Jane Reynolds of Plymouth, who had plighted her troth
to a seaman. As they were about to be married, he was pressed and
carried off to sea. Three years later, news arrived that he was dead,
and then she married a carpenter, and lived with him for five years,
and bore him three children. At the end of seven years an evil spirit
assumed the likeness of her dead lover, and appeared to her, and
induced her to leave with him. He carried her off, and she was never
seen again. The husband, in despair, hung himself. Such is the theme
of a lengthy ballad in the Roxburgh Collection, ed. Chappell, iii.
p. 200. There are copies as well in the Pepys and Ewing Collections.
It was printed by F. Coles (1646-1674), Gilbertson (1654-1663), Vere
(1640-1680), and W. Oney (1650-1702). It was a sorry composition.

Now, the traditional ballad, as compared with the printed ballad, is
superior at every point. It begins abruptly with the address of the
sailor to the carpenter's wife, without the long story that precedes
his attempt to cajole her to elope. Moreover, there is in it no
intimation that the tempter is an evil spirit in the form of the dead
lover, and when she has eloped, she pines not for three, but for her
one babe, whom she has deserted.

Thirteen of the verses of the traditional ballad are found in "The
Rambler's Garland," B.M. (1162, c 2). A form closely resembling our
Devon ballad is in Buchan's "Ballads of the North of Scotland," i.
p. 214, but is longer, consisting of twenty-six stanzas. Kinloch,
Motherwell, and Laidlaw have also portions of it. Laidlaw, in a
letter to Scott, January 3, 1803, says of the ballad, as sung to him
by Walter Grieve: "He likewise sung part of a very beautiful ballad
which I think you will not have seen.... The tune is very solemn and
melancholy, and the effect is mixed with a considerable proportion of
horror." See Child, No. 243.

The printed ballad that is in the Roxburgh Collection is, I feel
convinced, a clumsy re-writing of the earlier ballad, so as to
convey a moral, as its title implies, "A Warning to Married Women."
James Harris is the demon lover. In the traditional ballad, when the
carpenter's wife has eloped, she falls into deep depression--

     "I do not weep for your gold, she said,
     Nor do I weep for your fee,
     But by the masthead stands my baby dead,
     And I weep, I weep for my dead babie....

     "She had not a-been upon the seas
     But six days of the week,
     Before that she lay as cold as clay
     And never a word, one word did speak.

     "They had not a-been upon the seas
     Of weeks but three and four,
     But down to the bottom the ship did swim
     And never was heard of, heard of more."

There is another ballad running on somewhat similar lines, "The
Undutiful Daughter," who is in like manner enticed away; but the ship
will not proceed, and lots are cast who is to be thrown overboard.
The lot falls on the girl, and she is cast into the sea, but the body
swims before the ship and reaches land first. This ballad we have
taken down several times.

The last verse (six) I have added to make some sort of conclusion to
the song.

What the air is to which the ballad is sung in Scotland I do not know.

77. POOR OLD HORSE. Words and melody from Matthew Baker. The song is
given in Bell's "Ballads of the English Peasantry," p. 184, as sung
by the mummers in the neighbourhood of Richmond, Yorkshire. He says:
"The rustic actor who sings this song is dressed as an old horse,
and at the end of every verse the jaws are snapped in chorus. It is
a fine composition, and is now (1864) printed for the first time."
This is not so; it has long existed on Broadside by Hodges of Seven
Dials, and Such, etc. The Midland air of the song in Mason's "Nursery
Rhymes and Country Songs," 1877. Mr. Kidston has obtained several
versions of the song in Yorkshire and Lancashire. A fine setting was
sung at the Folk-Song Competition at Kendal in 1903. It is given in
_Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. pp. 75 and 260.

In "Sailors' Songs and Chanties," Boosey & Co., the song is given
under the title of "The Dead Horse." In Derbyshire, at Christmas,
boys and young men were wont, and may be still are wont, to go about,
one dressed as a horse, with a horse's skull in his hands or affixed
to his head; then this song was sung by the attendants and money
asked for the feeding of the beast, and the head was made to snap
its jaws. The song is also given in Topcliff's "Melodies of the Tyne
and Wear," N.D., but _circ._ 1815, and is also found on
Broadsides by Such.

Mr. Sharp has given a version in his "Folk-Songs from Somerset," No.
27.

78. THE DILLY SONG. An almost endless number of versions of this
song have been taken down, and have been sent to us. It is known
throughout Cornwall, and is, indeed, still sung in the chapels. When
a party of amateurs performed the "Songs of the West" in Cornwall,
1890, the Dilly Song always provoked laughter among the good folk at
the back of the halls. This puzzled the performers, till they learned
that folk laughed because this was their familiar chapel hymn. In
the text I have given the version of the words with least of the
religious element in them. Here are some of the other versions--

2. "God's own Son, or Christ's Natures"; or "The strangers o'er the
wide world rangers"; or "The lily-white maids."

3. "Three is all eternity"; "Three are the Thrones." The strangers
are probably the Wise Men from the East.

4. "The Gospel Preachers"; "The Evangelists."

5. "The Ferryman in the Boat"; "The Nimble Waiters."

6. "The Cherubim Watchers"; "The Crucifix"; "The Cherrybird Waiters."

7. "The Crown of Heaven"; "The Seven Stars."

8. "The Great Archangel"; "The Angels"; "The Daybreak."

9. "The Nine Delights," _i.e._ the Joys of Mary; "The Moonshine."

10. "The Commandments"; "Begin Again."

11. "The Eleven Disciples"; "They that go to Heaven."

There are similar verses in German and Flemish; a Scottish version
in Chambers' "Popular Rhymes," 1842, p. 50. Also found in Brittany:
Luzel, "Chansons Populaires," 1890, p. 88. There is a Mediæval Latin
form, beginning "Unus est Deus." A Hebrew form is printed in Mendez:
"Service for the First Night of the Passover," London, 1862; a
Moravian form in Wenzig: "Slavischer Märchen-Schatz," 1857, p. 295.
It is also sung in the Eifel, Schmitz: "Sitten u. Bräuche des Eifler
Volkes," Trier, 1856, p. 113. A Greek form is in Sanders: "Volksleben
der Neugriechen." See also: Coussemaker, "Chants populaires des
Flamands," Gand, 1850; Villemarqué, Barzas Breis, 1846, and later
editions.

The lily-white boys are probably the Gemini, or sign for Spring. In
the "Queen-like Closet, or Rich Cabinet," 1681, are instructions for
embroidering emblems of the months. "May is to be clothed in a robe
of _white and green_, and his sign must be Gemini."

"The Ferryman in the Boat" is perhaps Charon. In other versions Five
is the Dilly-bird, or the Dilly-hour, "when blooms the dilly-flower."

Some are obviously merely adopted as rhymes, as "six the crucifix."

In Cornwall and Devon the song goes by the name of "The Dilly Song."
What the meaning of "Dilly" is must remain uncertain. Possibly it
signifies the Festal Song (Welsh, _dillyn_, pretty, gay).

The song used to be sung by Eton boys. It was introduced by Sir
Arthur Sullivan into "The Yeomen of the Guard"; he, I believe, heard
it sung by a sailor. His melody bears a certain relationship to ours.
The song requires to be sung by at least two persons, a questioner
and the responder.

79. COUNTRY DANCE. This dance tune, called "The Mallard," because
of some silly words that go to it relative to the gobbling up of a
mallard. It begins--

     "Oh, what have I ate, and what have I ate?
     I have eaten the toe of a mallard.
           Toe and toe, nevins and all,
     And I have been to ballery allery,
     And so good meat was the mallard."

The singer proceeds to eat the foot, then the leg, the thigh, the
rump, the wing, the back, the breast, the neck, the head; and then
the dance was concluded. A Breton version in Luzel, p. 80. I have
written fresh words to the tune.

This tune is in the Dorian mode. As sung by J. Masters, the E was
sharpened in the 3rd bar but flattened on the repetition of the
same phase in the penultimate bar. Mr. Sheppard, when arranging
the song, flattened the E throughout. It must be one thing or the
other. Flattened throughout, it makes a charming melody, but the last
flattened E was probably due to the singer's memory failing him in
the latter part of the air, but serving him at the beginning of the
tune. Mr. Sharp has accordingly retained the E natural throughout.
The opening phrase is similar to the Plain-Song Easter Carol, "_O
Filii et Filiæ_." This was a melody used in French folk-song for the
welcoming in of spring. In fact, a May song. It forced its way into
the service of the Church, and was adopted and used for the Easter
Sequence. See Tiersot, _op. cit._, pp. 361, 391. It is certainly
curious finding the same in Devonshire folk-music. Neither Mr.
Sheppard nor I observed it; it was pointed out by Mr. Sharp.

80. CONSTANT JOHNNY. Words and melody taken down from Roger Luxton.
It was a dialogue, and so Mr. Sheppard had arranged it. Such lover
dialogues are and were very commonly sung in farmhouses. Ravenscroft
gives one in broad Devonshire in his "Brief Discourse," 1614,
entitled, "Hodge Trellindle and his Zweethart Malkyn." Our ballad
seems to be based on "Doubtful Robin and Constant Nanny," _circ._
1680, in the "Roxburgh Ballads."

These dialogue songs between a lover and his lass were very popular.
Addison, in _The Guardian_ of 1713, gives snatches of a West Country
ballad of this kind, and shows how vastly superior it is to the
pastorals of Dresden china shepherds and shepherdesses of Pope and
Philips.

81. THE DUKE'S HUNT. Words and melody taken from James Olver, again
at Stoke Gabriel, again at Mary Tavy, again at Menheniot. This is a
mere cento from a long ballad, entitled "The Fox Chase," narrating a
hunt by Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham, in the reign of Charles
II. It is in the Roxburgh Collection, and was printed by W. Oury,
_circ._ 1650. The ballad is there said to be sung "to an excellent
tune, much in request." We suspect that the melody we give is the
original tune handed down traditionally, and never before published.
Mr. Sharp has noted down the same song and melody from a singer at
East Harptree, Somerset.

82. THE BELL RINGING. Words and air from William George Kerswell, Two
Bridges, Dartmoor; sung also by James Down, blacksmith, Broadwood
Widger. Broadbury Down is the highest ridge of land between Dartmoor
and the Atlantic.

83. A NUTTING WE WILL GO. Taken down from J. Gerrard, an old man,
nearly blind, at Cullyhole, near Chagford, from Robert Hard, and
again at Menheniot, and also from James Parsons. Bunting, in his
"Irish Melodies," 1840, gives the same tune to a fragment of the same
words, and says that he took it down in 1792 from Duncan, a harper.
Duncan remembered a portion of a tune he had heard, perhaps, from
English soldiers, and eked it out with some other tune. Then came
S. Lover, and he took this air from Bunting, and wrote to it "The
Lowbacked Car." But the original melody is found, not only in Devon
and Cornwall, but also in the North, and Mr. Kidson gives it in his
"Traditional Tunes," as "With Henry Hunt we'll go," a song sung in
Manchester in connection with the arrest of Hunt in 1819. To the same
air was set "The Plains of Waterloo." "The Lowbacked Car" has become
popular through its words, and the inartistic quality of a patchwork
tune has been forgiven for their sake.

The words "The Nutgirl" occur on Broadsides by Fortey, Such, etc.
See Ballads collected by Crampton, B.M. (11,621, h), and (1875, b
19); but these are without the chorus. The printed Broadside has lost
somewhat. For Gerard's--

     "His voice rang out so clear and stout,
     It made the horse-bells ring,"

it gives--

     "His voice was so melodious,
     It made the valleys ring."

The Broadside ballad consists of fourteen verses, and is very gross.
I have had to considerably tone down the words.

An earlier Broadside by Pitts has the chorus.

The same air was employed for the ballads, "In January last, on
Monday at Morn," for "The Brags of Washington," 1775, for "Calder
Fair," and "To Rodney we will go." It is given in the third edition
of "Scotch, Irish, and Foreign Airs," Glasgow, 1788.

A version is in _Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 127, as taken down in
Sussex. This version begins--

     "And as this brisk young farmer was ploughing up his land,
     He called to his horses and bade them gently stand.
     He sat himself down a song to begin,
     His voice was so melodious, made the valleys to ring.
     And as this brisk young damsel was nutting in the wood,
     His voice was so melodious, it charmed her as she stood;
     She had no longer power in that lonely wood to stay,
     And what few nuts she'd got, poor girl, she threw them all away."

84. DOWN BY A RIVER SIDE. Taken down from the singing of James
Townsend, Holne. He had learned it from his grandfather, who had been
parish clerk of Holne for fifty years and died in 1883, over eighty
years old. A version, recovered in Surrey, is given in the _Folk-Song
Journal_, vol. i. p. 204.

85. THE BARLEY RAKINGS. Taken down from Roger Hannaford, Lower
Widdecombe, Dartmoor. The words exist in Broadside versions by Such,
Bingham of Lincoln, Robertson of Wigton, etc. Such's version consists
of six verses, the others of four. Hannaford's verses 2 and 3 were
unlike those of Bingham and Robertson, but resembled 3 and 4 of Such.
He had not 2 and 6 of Such. He had a curious line in verse 2: "They
had a mind to _style_ and play" (the Anglo-Saxon _styllan_, to leap
or dance), not found in the printed copies. As none of these versions
would be tolerable to polite ears, Mr. Sheppard has modified the
words considerably. The melody to which "Barley Rakings" is sung in
other parts of England is wholly different. Ours is probably an early
dance tune, originally in the Mixolydian Mode, which has undergone
modification in oral transmission.

86. A SHIP CAME SAILING OVER THE SEA. This curious song was obtained
by the late Rev. S.M. Walker of Saint Enoder, Cornwall, from a
very old man in his parish, and it was sent me by Miss Octavia L.
Hoare. We heard the same from old Sally Satterley at Huckaby Bridge,
Dartmoor. She was the daughter of an old crippled singing man on the
moor. I have told the story of the way in which she as a young bride
with her husband took possession of a house built all in one day, in
my Dartmoor Idylls, "Jolly Lane Cott." Sally is now dead, and her
house has been rebuilt and vulgarised. One verse, running--

     "I put my finger into the bush
       Thinking the sweetest rose to find,
     I prickt my finger to the bone,
       And yet I left the rose behind,"

is found in "The Distressed Virgin," a ballad by Martin Parker,
printed by J. Coles, 1646-74. Parker seems to have taken the lines
into his ballad from one previously existing. Two of the stanzas,
3 and 6, occur in the Scottish song, "Wally, wally up the Bank,"
in "Orpheus Caledonicus," 1733, No. 34; the stanzas 4 and 5 in the
song in "The Scot's Musical Museum," 1787-1803, vi. p. 582. In "The
Wandering Lover's Garland," _circ._ 1730, are two of the verses
worked into another ballad.

We took down the song a third time from William Nichols of
Whitchurch, near Tavistock. It was a song of his grandmother's, who
seventy years ago was hostess of the village inn.

87. THE RAMBLING SAILOR. Words and music from Roger Hannaford. A
hornpipe tune. There are several versions of this on Broadsides.
Originally the song was "The Rambling Soldier," and so appears at
the middle and latter end of the 18th century. Then some poetaster
of Catnach's re-wrote it as "The Rambling Sailor," destroying all
the point and wit of the original, which wit and point were not very
choice. But as in the West, the ditty is set to a hornpipe tune, we
have retained the song as one of a sailor, only modifying the words
where objectionable. The earliest copy of "The Rambling Soldier"
that I have seen was in the possession of Dr. Barrett; a later copy,
_circ._ 1820, by Whiting of Birmingham, Ballads, B.M. (1876, c 2).
"The Rambling Sailor," by Disley, _circ._ 1830, in Ballads collected
by Crampton, B.M. (11,621), vol. viii.

Mr. Sharp has taken this song and air down in N. Devon and Somerset
four or five times, in every case with a flattened 7th in the
Mixolydian mode. Our version is clearly a modernised edition of the
older tune.

88. WILLIE COMBE. This ballad is known throughout the length and
breadth of Cornwall, but it is sometimes mixed up with another, "The
Alternon Volunteer." We have taken it down at least a score of times.
Some of those from whom we have had it are Thomas Morris, parish
clerk of Fowey; J. Libby, coachman at Tredethy, Bodmin; Anthony
Pascoe, Liskeard; and Anne Painter, East Looe.

The incident referred to in the ballad is the accidental shooting of
William Combe or Coome of St. Agnes, at the Revel or Village Feast at
Crantock in 1721. In the parish register at this date is the entry:
"William Coome of St. Agnes, a youth about 20 years of age, who att
the ffeast att this Parish rec'd his death of a shot; buried May
17."

Crantock Feast is on May 16.

There are a good many more verses in the original than are here
given. They have no poetic merit; and the tune is not very original,
but has a certain plaintive sweetness.

89. MIDSUMMER CAROL. Words and tune from William Aggett of Chagford.
A very early and curious melody of the same date as the "May Day
Carol," No. 47; and the words belong to a similar custom. Compare
with this "Lemonday" in our "Garland of Country Songs." Originally
doubtless an Æolian, perhaps a Dorian tune, that has been corrupted
and modernised.

90. THE BLACKBIRD. The melody and words taken down from James Parson,
Roger Hannaford, and John Voysey, labourer, Lew Down.

I re-wrote the ballad for the first edition, but in this I have
restored the original words, only slightly modifying them.

A Broadside version has nine stanzas, and ends--

     "So here's a health to the bird in the bush,
     Likewise to the linnet and thrush;
     For birds of a feather will all flock together,
     Let their parents say little or much."

The same ballad in Lyle's Collection, 1827, "From Recollection; air
plaintive and pastoral." A Broadside version of this ballad in nine
stanzas by Williamson of Newcastle. Song and air are given also in
Kidson's "Traditional Tunes," 1891, as taken down in Yorkshire; but
that version of the melody is inferior to ours. A Welsh version of
the tune comes nearer to ours.

91. THE GREEN BED. Taken down from J. Masters. We heard "The
Outlandish Knight" sung to the same melody by Richard Gregory on
Dartmoor. "The Green Bed" exists as a Broadside ballad in six double
verses. Mr. Sheppard has re-written the ballad, and has condensed
the story. The air somewhat resembles "The Girl I left behind me."
See "Philander's Garland," _circ._ 1780, B.M. (11,621, c 4). See
_Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 48.

92. THE LOYAL LOVER. Words and air from Sally Satterley, Huckaby
Bridge, again from Anne Roberts, Scobbetor, Widdecombe. The words
exist in part in "Collin and Phoebe's Garland," B.M. (11,621, c
5). But this has two verses only. See also _The Lover's Magazine_,
London, 1740, B.M. (11,621, c 26). This air has been harmonised in
the Dorian mode, though as the 6th of the scale is absent, it might
have been treated as an Æolian tune.

93. THE STREAMS OF NANTSIAN. Properly "The Streams of Lovely Nancy."
Taken down by Miss Templer from the singing of harvesters in 1834;
also by us from Matthew Ford, Menheniot; Matthew Baker, Lew Down; and
James Oliver, Launceston. Matthew Baker said that he learned it, when
aged ten, in 1827.

The ballad was printed by Keys of Devonport, _circ._ 1830, with four
verses, of which verse 3 was an importation from another ballad. In
other Broadside versions, the short original, consisting of four
verses only, has been swelled out with scraps from other ballads to
fill available space. Broadsides by Catnach, Whiting of Birmingham,
etc.

94. THE DRUNKEN MAIDENS. Taken down from Edmund Fry, Lydford. This
old ballad is found in "Charming Phillis' Garland," _circ._ 1710. It
is in a Broadside by Crashaw of York, reprinted in Logan's "Pedlar's
Pack," 1869, p. 241. The last verse has had to be modified.

A Breton version, "Merc'hed Caudan," is given by Luzel, ii. 142.

95. TOBACCO IS AN INDIAN WEED. This old and famous song was written,
it is thought, by George Withers, as Mr. Collier found a copy of it
in MS. of the date of James I., with his initials to it. It is found
in "Merry Drollery Complete," 1670, and on a Broadside dated 1672. We
give the tune to which it is sung around Dartmoor and in Cornwall;
this is entirely distinct from that to which it is sung elsewhere, as
printed by Chappell, ii. p. 564, which is the air given by D'Urfey in
his "Pills to Purge Melancholy," 1719, iii. 292. A Somerset version
was sung at the Folk-Song Competition at Frome, 1904. Snatches of the
song are given in "Handy Andy," so that we may assume that it is also
well known among the Irish peasantry; another instance of the way in
which English songs have travelled into Ireland. We took down our
tune from John Potter, Merripit, Postbridge, and from Anne Roberts,
Scobbetor, and H. Westaway, Belstone; also one obtained from an old
man at Newton Abbot, sent to me.

In the original ballad, reprinted in Bell's "Songs and Ballads of the
English Peasantry," there are many more stanzas than we can give here.

96. FAIR SUSAN SLUMBERED. Music taken down from George Cole,
quarryman, Rundlestone, Dartmoor. The words were so utterly worthless
that Mr. Sheppard wrote a fresh copy of verses to the melody. Cole's
first verses ran--

     "In yonder grove sat a lovely creature,
       Who she is, I do not know;
     But I'll go court her for her feature,
       Whether she'll answer me Yes or No!

     "O maiden I am come a-courting
       If your favour I can gain;
     If that you will but entertain me,
       Then I'm sure I'll call again."

The original words are to be found in "The Vocal Library," London,
1822, No. 1,421: "As a Fair Maid walked."

97. THE FALSE BRIDE. Words and music taken down from old Sally
Satterley.

The earliest copy in print with which I am acquainted is in "The New
Pantheon Concert," 1773, B.M. (11,621, e 6). A re-writing of the
theme is on a Broadside by Such, "When I heard he was married I stood
not alone"; it is No. 592. See also a "Collection of Old Ballads," in
the B.M., vol. i. p. 490, "The Forlorn Lover."

Mr. C. Sharp has obtained a fine air to the same words, and has
published it in "Folk-Songs from Somerset," No. 20.

98. BARLEY STRAW. Taken down from the singing of Mr. G.H. Hurell,
the blind organist at Chagford, as he heard it sung by a carpenter,
William Beare, in 1875. The words were very coarse, consequently
Mr. Sheppard re-wrote the song. The air was used by A.S. Rich,
without its most characteristic passages, for Hunneman's comic "Old
King Cole," pub. _circ._ 1830. Much the same tune is in Akerman's
"Wiltshire Tales," 1853, as a Wiltshire Harvest Home, p. 132.
Harmonised in the Æolian mode, though the seventh of the scale is
absent.

99. DEATH AND THE LADY. This was first sent to me by Captain Hall
Munro, of Ingesdon House, Newton Abbot, as sung by an old man there.
Subsequently we obtained the same from Roger Hannaford. This is quite
different from the "Dialogue of Death and the Lady," found in black
letter Broadsides, and given by Bell in his "Songs of the English
Peasantry," p. 32. The tune to this latter is given by Chappell,
i. p. 167. In Carey's "Musical Century," 1738, is given the air of
"Death and the Lady" as "an old tune." But this melody and ours have
nothing in common.

What is the signification of "branchey tree" in connection with
Death, I am at a loss to say. "Death and the Lady" was one of the
ballads sung by Farmer Williams in "The Vicar of Wakefield."

100. BOTH SEXES GIVE EAR TO MY FANCY. This old song is a favourite
with the peasantry throughout England. The words are printed in
Bell's "Songs of the English Peasantry," p. 231. He says, "We have
had considerable trouble in procuring a copy of the old song, which
used, in former days, to be very popular with aged people resident
in the North of England. It has been long out of print, and handed
down traditionally. By the kindness of Mr. S. Swindells, printer,
Manchester, we have been favoured with an ancient printed copy." In
the original the song consists of ten verses. The earliest copy of
it that I know is in "The Lady's Evening Book of Pleasure," about
1740. It will be found in a collection of garlands made by Mr. J.
Bell about 1812, and called by him "The Eleemosynary Emporium." It
is in the British Museum. The air is found in "Vocal Music, or the
Songster's Companion," 2nd ed., 1772, to the song, "Farewell, Ye
Green Fields and Sweet Groves," p. 92. It was taken into "The Tragedy
of Tragedies, or Tom Thumb," 1734, as the air to "In Hurry, Posthaste
for a Licence," and was attributed to Dr. Arne. In "Die Familie
Mendelssohn," vol. ii., is a scrap of music written down by Felix
Mendelssohn, dated Leipzig, 16th August 1840, which is identical with
the first few bars of this melody. But the earliest form of the air
is in J.S. Bach's "Comic Cantata," where a peasant sings it.

We took the song down from John Rickards, Lamerton, and again from
J. Benney, Menheniot. Mr. Kidson prints a Yorkshire version in his
"Traditional Tunes," 1891. Miss L. Broadwood has noted it down from
the singing of a baker at Cuckfield, Sussex. Dr. Barrett gives our
melody to "The Gallant Hussar," No. 13. We have also taken it down to
this ballad; so has Mr. Sharp in Somerset.

101. I RODE MY LITTLE HORSE. Words and music from Edmund Fry,
Lydford, and again from John Bennett, a labourer at Chagford, and
from John Hunt, a shepherd, Postbridge.

Compare with this the ballad in d'Urfey's "Pills to Purge
Melancholy," named "Jolly Roger Twangdillo," 1719, i. p. 19. A
Broadside copy of the ballad exists, printed by Jennings, of
Waterlane, London, _circ._ 1790.

The same theme is used in a ballad in the Pepysian Collection. See
Ebsworth, "Roxburgh Ballads," vii. 231. Each verse ends--

"I vow I will marry, but I know not when."

102. AMONG THE NEW-MOWN HAY. Bell, in his "Ballads and Songs of the
Peasantry," p. 223, gives this song. He says that it is "a village
version of an incident which occurred in the Cecil family." Tennyson
composed his "Lord of Burleigh" on the same topic. So did Moore his
song, "You remember Helen, the hamlet's pride." But it may well be
questioned whether either of these compositions comes up to the grace
of the little "village version" of the tale.

The ballad, however, is probably earlier than the Cecil marriage, and
refers to some other legendary mésalliance. Henry Cecil, afterwards
Earl and still later first Marquis of Exeter, saw, loved, and
married a farmer's daughter named Sarah Hoggins, at Bolas Magna in
Staffordshire, in 1790, he under the assumed name of John Jones. She
was then aged seventeen, and he aged thirty-seven. Moreover, he was
married at the time to Miss Vernon, a Worcestershire lady, to whom
he had been united in 1776. In 1791, Henry Cecil obtained a divorce
from his wife, Emma Vernon, and then was married in his proper name
to Sarah Hoggins, at St. Mildred's, Bread Street, in the City of
London. Not fully six years later the "Cottage Countess" died; and
after three years the widower espoused a divorcée, sometime wife of
the eighth Duke of Hamilton. Happily no question as to the legitimacy
of the children arose. Henry, the eldest, was not born till 1793. He
died the same year; but his brother, Brownlow, born two years later,
lived to succeed his father in 1804.

These plain facts take away most of the romance of the story of
the "Cottage Countess." Moreover, Henry Cecil did not meet his
Sarah among the new-mown hay. He arrived at Bolas in a chaise in a
snow-storm, late in November 1788, and was lodged for a few nights in
the farm. There he saw Sarah, who with friends was dancing. She was
then only fifteen and a half years old. Cecil left, but returned in
eighteen months and married her, as already said, under an assumed
name, and before he was quit of his first wife. The whole story has
been told in _Chambers's Edinburgh Journal_, part 60 (sixth series),
December 1, 1902.

Melody taken down from James Dingle, Coryton.

103. I'LL BUILD MYSELF A GALLANT SHIP. The words are a cento from
a long ballad. The complete song was taken down from J. Watts,
quarryman, Thrushleton. The entire ballad is in Logan's "Pedlar's
Pack," p. 23. There are several Broadside versions. A Scottish
version in Herd, "Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs," 1776, ii. p.
2. The air to which this is sung in Scotland is that to which Burns
composed "Of a' the airts the wind can blaw." Joyce gives an Irish
version in his "Ancient Irish Music," No. 68. Besides Watts' ballad,
we had the fragment we give to the same air from Richard Cleave,
since dead, at the "Forest Inn," Huckaby Bridge. Never shall I forget
the occasion. Mr. Bussell and I drove across Dartmoor in winter in
a furious gale of wind and rain to Huckaby in quest of an old man
who, we had been informed, was a singer. We found the fellow, but he
yielded nothing, and our long journey would have been fruitless, had
we not caught Richard Cleave and obtained from him this air, which
drive cost me a bronchitis attack that held me a prisoner for six
weeks.

The song is given under the title "The Lowlands of Holland," in the
_Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 97, as taken down in Sussex.

104. COLLY MY COW. This is a portion of an old ballad in the Roxburgh
Collection, ed. Chappell, iii. p. 601--

     "Little Tom Dogget, what doest thou mean,
     To kill thy poor Colly now she's so lean?
     Sing oh! poor Colly, Colly my cow;
     For Colly will give me no more milk now.
     Pruh high, pruh hoe, pruh high, pruh hoe,
     Pruh, pruh, pruh, pruh, pruh, pruh, pruh, tal-dal daw."

Printed by T. Passinger (1670-86) at the Seven Stars on London
Bridge. The ballad is also found in the Rawlinson Collection and
elsewhere. It was afterwards sung in a shortened form at the concerts
in Marylebone Gardens, and is printed in "The Marylebone Concert,"
N.D.

In the heading to the old ballad we have--

     "A country swain of little wit, one day
     Did kill his cow, because she went astray."

But it is probable that the song originally turned on a different
theme. On the 9th September 1605, a man was killed by a Protestant
in the Rue de la Harpe, at Paris, for singing the song "De Colas."
This song was composed by a seditious faction, with the intent of
provoking the Huguenots, upon the subject of a cow which had walked
into one of their conventicles during the performance of divine
service. The cow, which belonged to a poor peasant named Colas, was
killed by the Huguenots for her sacrilegious act. Thereupon the
Catholics made a collection in every town and village in France to
raise a sum for the indemnification of Colas. The day after the
murder the singing of the song of "Colas his Cow," was forbidden
under the penalty of the gallows, and it was even dangerous for
anyone to hum the tune in the street ("Concert Room Anecdotes," 1825,
ii. p. 230). The song must have been brought to England and adapted
to English words after the Restoration, and as the story of the
occasion of the killing of the cow was forgotten, it was altered. The
tune is very old, and we had it from an aged woman at Kingsweare,
who sang "The Abbot of Canterbury" to it. But this has its own tune,
given by Chappell, i. p. 348. I have added the final verse.

105. WITHIN A GARDEN. Taken down from Harry Smith, Two Bridges,
Dartmoor. The original words were so poor, and so closely resembled
those of "The Broken Token" (No. 44), that Mr. Shepherd wrote fresh
words. The original began--

     "A fair maid walking in her garden,
       A brisk young sailor came passing by;
     And he stepped up to her, thinking to woo her,
       And said, 'Fair maid, can you fancy I?'

     "'You seem to talk like some man of honour,
       Some man of honour, you seem to be;
     How can you fancy such a poor young woman,
       Not fit your servant for to be?'"

The ballad is published by Such as "The Young and Single Sailor," No.
126. It is also in "The Vocal Library," London, 1822, p. 525. It was
printed on Broadside by Catnach as "The Sailor's Return." We obtained
it again from James Parsons.

106. THE BONNY BIRD. Always sung as "My Bonny Boy." It is the
companion song to the "Jolly Goss Hawk" (No. 71). Words and melody
from Mary Langworthy, Stoke Fleming. We have taken this down from two
other singers, but not to the same tune; one J. Doidge, of Chillaton,
gave us an air characteristic and good. Miss Broadwood has the song
in her "County Songs," pp. 146-7, but to a different melody.

In all the versions taken down from oral recitation, the word is Boy
and not Bird, but _Bird_ is the original word. The ballad was printed
by J. Coles, 1646-74, and by W. Thackeray, 1660-1680, and is in the
Douce Collection of early Broadsides in the Bodleian Library; also in
the Pepysian Collection, and is printed by Ebsworth in the Roxburgh
Ballads, viii. p. 359.

It was originally sung to "Cupid's Trepan," also called "Up the Green
Forest," and "Bonny, Bonny Bird." This air is given by Chappell, ii.
p. 557, but this differs from our tune entirely, as also from that
given by Miss Broadwood. The ballad has not, as yet, been traced
earlier than the reign of Charles II. It begins--

     "Once I did love a bonny brave bird,
       And thought he had been all my own;
     But he loved another far better than me,
       And has taken his flight and is flown,
           Bonny Boys,
       And has taken his flight and is flown.

     "Up the green forest, and down the green forest,
       Like one distracted in mind,
     I hoopt and I hoopt, and I flung up my hood,
       But my bonny bird I could not find."

A later version is found, _circ._ 1780, in Single Sheet Broadsides,
in the British Museum (11,621).

"Cupid's Trepan or Up the Green Forest" was priced in Russell Smith's
Catalogue at £1, 11s. 6d.

107. THE LADY AND APPRENTICE. Taken down twice, the tune here given
is that sung with these words by Samuel Fone. We got the melody
also from Sally Satterley, but with her the words were in confusion.
The ballad runs on the same lines, and is almost identical with "The
Lady who fell in love with a 'Prentice Boy," printed as a Broadside
by Pitts, 1790-1810; also by Harkness of Preston. A copy in the
British Museum (1876, d). This ballad begins like that of "Cupid's
Garden," which is well known. But the ballad is a mere cooking up by
a balladmonger of the earlier theme, and very badly done.

The melody is actually the same as that of "Love's Tale" in our
"Garland of Country Song."

108. PAUL JONES. Taken down from a good many singers on and around
Dartmoor. The melody is in the Mixolydian mode, and is very early and
rugged, far older than the period of Paul Jones himself. Mr. C. Sharp
says: "In my opinion the tune should perhaps never be harmonised at
all. The whole air is cast in the chord of the dominant 7th, and, in
the opinion of most authorities, this chord should end the song; but
in view of the popular preference for a concord rather than a discord
as the concluding harmony, I have ended with the usual cadence."

Paul Jones was the terror of our coasts; he was born near
Kirkcudbright in 1747. His real name was John Paul. When the rupture
took place between Great Britain and America, he enlisted under the
Revolutionary flag, and assumed the name of Paul Jones. His daring
disposition, and his knowledge of the British coast, pointed him out
as a fitting leader in marauding schemes. Towards the end of 1777
he was actively employed, as commander, in fitting out the _Ranger_
privateer, mounting eighteen guns, and manned with a crew of 150 men.
We have not the space for narrating his daring exploits; his life has
often been written, and a good notice of him will be found in the
"Dictionary of National Biography." The fight described in the ballad
took place on September 23, 1779. The body of Paul Jones was removed
from Paris, where he died, to America in 1905.

The ballad is found on Broadsides. It is given by Logan in his
"Pedlar's Pack," p. 32. Dr. Barrett, in his "English Folk-Songs," No.
33, has the ballad to the tune we have given here to "The Bonny Blue
Kerchief," to which Paul Jones is quite unsuited.

109. THE MERRY HAYMAKERS. This quaint carol-like song was taken down
from John Woodrich, who learned it, about 1850, and he says that it
was his father's favourite song, also from James Parsons. Neither
knew the words in their entirety, but they may be found in "West
Country Garlands," B.M. (11,621, b 11), and among the Broadsheets of
Pitts, about the beginning of the nineteenth century, beginning "In
the merry month of June." The words also in Bell's "Ballads of the
English Peasantry," p. 171. Dr. Brushfield of Budleigh Salterton has
kindly sent me a MS. copy of the end of the seventeenth century or
early in the eighteenth. The words, however, did not fit the tune
comfortably, and I was constrained to re-write the song.

"The Merry Haymakers" is in D'Urfey's "Pills," and as a Broadside
printed by C.B. (Bates), 1695, was priced in Russell Smith's
Catalogue, 1850, at three guineas.

110. IN BIBBERLY TOWN. The air taken down from John Bennett,
Chagford. In Broadsides the place is "Beverley Town," and is entitled
"The Beverley Maid and the Tinker," printed by Catnach, B.M. (1876,
c 2); as "The Tinker's Frolic," in a Garland in the British Museum,
printed by Swindells, Manchester (11,621, b 14); as "The Tinker and
Chambermaid," a Broadside by Harkness, Preston (1876, d). It begins--

     "In Beverley Town a maid did dwell,
     A buxom lass, I knew her well.
     Her age it was just twenty-two,
     And for a man she had in view."

It is a coarse ballad, and Mr. Sheppard re-wrote it. The first phrase
in the melody is apparently a modernised edition of an older one. The
rest of the air is ancient, and in the Mixolydian mode.

111. THE MARIGOLD. This ballad was first taken down by Davies Gilbert
in 1830 from an old man named John Hockin, in his eighty-sixth
year, at St. Erth, Cornwall. The melody, which is very early, was,
curiously enough, used by William Aggett for Hook's song, "On board
the ninety-eight." Hook was born in 1746, and the melody is probably
two centuries earlier than his time. There was another Bristol
ballad, "The Honour of Bristol, showing how the Angel Gabriel of
Bristol fought with three Spanish Ships, who boarded us Seven times,
wherein we cleared our Decks, and killed Five hundred of their men,
and wounded many more, and made them flye into Cales when we lost but
three men, to the Honour of the Angel Gabriel of Bristol," priced in
Russell Smith's Catalogue at £2, 12s. 6d.

We have taken down the ballad, "Come all ye worthy Christian men,"
to this melody, which is in the Dorian mode. A fragment of this
latter ballad is given in _Folk-Song Journal_, vol. i. p. 74, taken
down in Sussex, in five verses. We have had it twice: once from J.
Dingle, Coryton, and once as learned in 1820 by George Radford, from
a blind fiddler at Washfield, near Tiverton, and "pricked down" by
H. Pinkney, gardener, Washfield. Mr. Sharp has also met with it in
Rackenford, N. Devon. The air in Sussex is not the same.

In "Hakluyt's Voyages," vol. iii. (1600), is an account of "The
Voyage of the ship called the Marigold of Mr. Hill of Redrife unto
Cape Breton and beyond, to the latitude of 44 degrees and a half,
1593, written by Rd. Fisher, Master Hille's man of Redriffe."

So also Hakluyt mentions "the Marigold 70 tunnes in burthen,
furnished with 20 men, whereof ten were mariners," which is stated
to have "departed out of Falmouth, the 1st June, 1593," commanded
by Richard Strong, "bound for an island within the straights of S.
Peter on the backe side of Newfoundland to the S.W. in the lat. of 47
degrees."

In Latimer's 17th century "Annals of Bristol" is mention made of a
ship "The Marigold," under the date 1627-8, of seventy tons, owned by
Mr. Ellis. It was granted letters of marque to prey upon the enemy's
commerce; but no mention is made of Sir Thomas Merrifield. The
_Redrife_ above is Redcliffe, Bristol. Bristol was spelled _Bristow_
in maps of the city published in 1568 and 1610, but in one of 1671 it
is spelled Bristoll.

I have been unable to find Sir Thomas Merrifield in any lists of
knights; but before the reign of James I. no official record of
knights was kept.

112. ARTHUR LE BRIDE. Taken down from Sam Fone, Mary Tavy, by Mr.
Bussell, in 1892. Sam told us that this was his father's favourite
song. He had learned it from his father when he was quite a child,
for the elder Fone deserted his family, and was never heard of again.
But one day Sam, when aged eighteen, saw a workman standing at a
cottage door, talking to someone within, and he had his hand against
the door-post, clutching it as he leaned forward. Sam exclaimed:
"That's my father's hand!" The man turned about, and without showing
his face, walked away. When Sam came from his work in the evening he
made enquiries, and ascertained that a stranger had been lodging in
the cottage for a few nights, but was gone. He asked the woman of the
house about her lodger. "Well," said she, "I don't know his name, nor
nothing about him. But he asked me for a tallow candle, and melted it
up into his boots." "That was my father. It was a trick of his," said
Sam, promptly. And that was the last ever seen of the man.

There was one more verse in the original, omitted to reduce the
lengthy ballad to singable proportions.

113. THE KEEPER. This song was taken down from Peter Sandry, St.
Ervan's. He had a bad cold, and could not reach the upper notes. But
we got the same tune from Mr. Jas. Ellis, Chaddlehanger, Lamerton,
and also from Miss Templer, from the singing of harvesters in 1834;
but in both these latter cases to the words of "Green Broom." A copy
of the ballad will be found in a "Garland," B.M., 11,621, c 3; but
this has a chorus to it--

     "Jack my master, sing you well,
     Very well, with my derry down,
         With my Down, down, down."

I have been compelled to re-write most of the song, which in the
original is very gross. It is certainly an ancient composition.

114. THE QUEEN OF HEARTS. Sung by a workman engaged on the Burrow-Tor
reservoir at Sheepstor, the water supply for Plymouth, 1894. A quaint
little song. It has been printed on Broadside by Bachelar, B.M., in
vol. vi. p. 110, of several volumes of Broadsides I gave to the B.M.
This begins--

     "O my poor heart, my poor heart is breaking
     For a false young man, or I am mistaking:
     He is gone to Ireland, for a long time to tarry,
     Some Irish girl I am afraid he will marry."

This is obviously an addition to fill out space in the Broadside. The
ballad has a flavour of the period of Charles II.

115. THE OWL. This song occurs in part in King Henry VIII.'s
music-book, "Deuteromelia," published in 1609. It was set by Mr.
Freeman as a glee in "The Essex Harmony," vol. i. 1767, p. 8. In
Beaumont and Fletcher's play, "The Knight of the Burning Pestle,"
1635, Old Merrythought trolls out snatches of songs, and amongst
others--

     "Nose, nose, jolly red nose,
     And who gave thee this jolly red nose?
     Cinnamon, ginger, nutmegs, and cloves,
     And they gave me this jolly red nose."

Mr. Bussell noted down the melody from James Olver, tanner of
Launceston, in 1889. Of the words, Olver could not recall the line
that follows

     "And all the day long the Owl is asleep,"

and I have had to supply what lacked.

I give this song because it is interesting to note the changes that
the air has undergone since it was performed as a Three Man's song
before King Henry VIII. It will be noticed that Olver has not got all
that portion of the song beginning "To whom drink'st thou." Chappell
has given "Of all the Birds," in i. p. 75. On the other hand, in
"Deuteromelia," only the first verse is given; Olver had three. A
re-writing of the song "Of all the Birds on Bush or Tree" in "The
Thrush," London, 1830, has two stanzas. The second concerns the lark.

116. MY MOTHER DID SO BEFORE ME. This song is based on the old
English ditty "My Father was Born before Me," as may be seen at once
by comparing the first few lines--

     "I am a lusty, lively lad
       Now come to one and twenty,
     My father left me all he had,
       Both gold and silver plenty.

     "Now he's in grave, I will be brave,
       The ladies shall adore me,
     I'll court and kiss, what hurt's in this?
       My father did so before me."

The first appearance of this ballad is in Thomas Jordan's "London
Triumphant," 1672. It was taken by D'Urfey into his "Pills to Purge
Melancholy," vol. i., 1699 and 1707. The air appears in the "Dancing
Master" as "Jamaca," 4th edition, 1670, and in those subsequent.

The tune we give was taken down to the song from S. Fone by Mr.
Sheppard in 1895.

"My Mother did so before Me" occurs without music in "The
Nightingale," a song-book published in Edinburgh, 1776, and is given
by Logan in his "Pedlar's Pack," 1869, from a chap-book of 1804. It
occurs also on a Broadside by Pitts of Seven Dials. It is also in
"The Quaver," Lond. 1831. The tune we have taken down is certainly
based on the early air as given in the "Dancing Master." It is in
Chappell, ii. p. 446.

117. A WEEK'S WORK WELL DONE. This popular song, relished by married
men, was taken down from Richard Hard a little over a month before
he died. In the original it is much longer. There are in all eleven
verses. The first four are concerned with the happiness of the man
previous to his marriage. But I find that most singers begin with the
fifth verse.

The ballad is found in "West Country Garlands," date _circ._ 1760,
B.M., 1161, b 11.

It actually begins thus--

     "O when that I was a bachelor brave,
     Enjoying of all that my soul could have;
     My silver and guineas I then let fly,
     I cock'd my beaver, and, who but I?

     "I roved about, and I roved awhile,
     Till all the ladies did on me smile;
     From noble lady to country Joan,
     Both gentle and simple, were all mine own.

     "My rapier it was a Bilboa blade,
     My coat and waistcoat were overlaid
     With silver spangles, so neat and gay,
     As I were a king in some country play.

     "Besides, I had such a flattering tongue,
     The ladies laughed whene'er I sung;
     I had a voice so sweet and fine
     That every lady's heart was mine."

118. THE OLD MAN CAN'T KEEP HIS WIFE AT HOME. The curious rugged
melody was taken down from a very old fiddler named William Andrews,
at Sheepstor, by Mr. Bussell. The old fellow did not recall all the
words, but remembered the story. According to his account this was a
dance tune to which the performers sang in accompaniment to the music
and tramp of feet.

I have had to re-compose the ballad from the fragment and the story.
It bears a family resemblance to "The Old Couple" given in "The
Garland of Country Song," p. 100. In the story the old man locks his
wife out. She threatens to drown herself, and throws a stone into
the well. The old man, when he hears the splash, descends, opens
the door, and goes forth to see whether his wife really has drowned
herself. At once she slips in at the open door and locks him out. The
story is very ancient. It occurred in the lost Sanscrit book of tales
of which Persian and Arabic and Turkish versions exist, and which
filtered into Europe through Greek and Latin and Hebrew translations.
This story came into Dolopathos and the Seven Wise Masters. The
French and Latin versions were made in the 13th century. But the
story had already got to Europe through the converted Jew, Peter
Alphonsus, who inserted it in his "Disciplina Clericalis," written
in 1062. From this it got into some of the versions of the "Gesta
Romanorum," and finally into Boccaccio's "Decameron," seventh day,
tale 4.

To give the whole story in ballad form would have made the ballad too
long; I have therefore reduced it to three verses, and have given it,
from the man's point of view, a happier termination.

The tune is clearly a bagpipe air with drone.

119. SWEET, FAREWELL. Taken down from Samuel Fone, of Mary Tavy, in
1889, the music noted by Mr. Bussell. Fone had forgotten the two last
lines of verse 1 and the two first of verse 2. The air is pleasant,
but the words are naught.

120. OLD ADAM, THE POACHER. This curious melody was taken down by
Mr. Bussell from the fiddling of William Andrews, Sheepstor. We saw
the old man a little over a year before his death. He brought out
and lent us a collection of MS. violin tunes, but all of these were
well-known, old-fashioned dance airs. Then he played to us several
not in his book that were traditional at Sheepstor. This was one of
them, a dance tune; but he could not recall the words, only he knew
that they told of the adventures of "Old Adam, the Poacher." Mr.
Sheppard arranged this for "English Minstrelsy," but did not perceive
that the first four lines of air have to be repeated to complete the
tune; and in taking the melody from the fiddler, one could not detect
at first, not knowing the words, where the tune precisely ended. It
seems, however, obvious that there is a repeat of the first strain. I
wrote the words.

121. EVENING PRAYER. Some fifty years ago this was the only, or
almost the only, prayer used by village children. It was said or
chanted far more extensively than the Lord's Prayer. The children
had, however, cut down the hymn to one verse. The complete song,
as "Prayer of the Week," was obtained from an old woman in the
workhouse at Tavistock. Where the passage occurs purporting to come
from the Epistles of St. Peter it would be hard to say. The tune, as
it stands, is in the Major mode, and is so harmonised. But if the
last note were G instead of E[flat]--as, indeed, it is in the two
previous repetitions of the same phrase--the melody would then be in
the Phrygian mode. The termination in E[flat] is probably a modern
corruption.

Something very much like this prayer is found throughout Europe. Here
is the Quercy version, sung also in Poitou, Gascony, and Brittany--

     "Father of habit, our Lord salutes you.
     He is at the head, He is at the feet;
         He is now, He is hereafter.
     On the bed, when I lie,
     Five angels are me by,
     Two to head and two to feet,
     The Mother of God in the midst, whilst I sleep.
     I need not fear fire and flame and sudden death," etc.

Daymard, "Chansons Populaires," Cahors, 1889. It is probably the
"White Paternoster" referred to in "The Miller's Tale," by Chaucer--

     "Lord Jhesu Crist, and Seynte Benedight,
     Bless this hous from every wikkede wight,
     Fro nyghtesmare werye the witte (white) Pater-noster."

White, in his "Way to the True Church," 1624, insists on "the
prodigious ignorance" which he found among his parishioners when
he entered on his ministrations. He gives what he calls "The White
Paternoster":--

     "White Paternoster, Saint Peter's brother,
     What hast i' th' one hand? White book leaves.
     What hast i' th' t'other hand? Heaven yate keyes.
     Open heaven yates, and streike hell yates:
     And let every crysome child creep to its own mother,
                   White Paternoster, Amen."

This, however, is not the same. But in the Magical Treatise,
"Enchiridion Papæ Leonis," Rome, 1660, it runs--

     "Petit Pate nôtre blanche que Dieu fit, que Dieu dit, que
     Dieu mit en Paradis. Au soir me allant coucher je trouve
     trois anges à mon lit couchés, un aux pieds, deux au
     chevet, la bonne Vierge Marie au milieu, qui me dit que je
     me arrette, que rien ne doute."

This was to be recited thrice at eve, thrice in the morning, and it
would secure Paradise.

The White Paternoster was proscribed by the Church as superstitious:
"Le Tableau de la vida del parfet Crestia," by P. Amilha, 1703, p.
234. See Victor Hugo, "Les Miserables," iv. p. 117.

A form used on the Cornish moors, and repeated by a boy at Alternon,
runs--

     "Ding dong, the parson's bell,
         Very well my mother.
     I shall be buried in the old churchyard,
         By the side of my dear brother.
     My coffin shall be black,
     Two little angels at my back,
     Two to watch, and two to pray,
     And two to carry my soul away.
     When I am dead and in my grave,
         And all my bones are rotten,
     Jesus Christ will come again
         When I am quite forgotten."

The boy was taught this by his aunt.

In the "Townley Mysteries," p. 91, the shepherds watching their
flocks by night repeat a form of this prayer. See also Ady's "Candle
in the Dark," London, 1650, p. 58; also a paper in the _Archæologia_,
xxvii. p. 253, by the Rev. Lancelot Sharpe; and Halliwell's "Nursery
Rhymes," No. ccxl.

Songs in the first edition omitted from this are--

  Fathom the Bowl.
  The Squire and the Fair Maid.
  My Lady's Coach.
  An Evening so Clear.
  The Warson Hunt.
  The Rout is Out.
  Why should we be dullards sad?
  Nancy.
  Farewell to Kingsbridge.
  Something Lacking.
  The Wrestling Match.
  Broadbury Gibbet.
  The Orchestra.
  Fair girl, mind this when you marry.
  Cupid, the Ploughboy.
  Come, my Lads, let us be jolly.
  A Single and a Married Life.
  The Saucy Ploughboy.
  The Everlasting Circle.
  Hunting the Hare.
  Dead Maid's Land.
  Shower and Sunshine.

The first edition is still kept in stock, so that such persons as
desire these ballads, and such others as are retained in this, but
treated differently, as duets and quartettes, can obtain them from
the publishers.

PRINTED BY

C.G. RODER,

LIMITED,

Willesden Junction

LONDON, N.W.]