The Two Little Boys- Tuttle (Ark.) 1941 Randolph C
[Fragment from Vance Randolph's Ozark Folksongs; 1946, Vol. I- British Ballads and Songs, with music. Randolph's notes follow.
R. Matteson 2012, 2014]
10. THE TWO BROTHERS
The ballad of "The Two Brothers" was long ago reported and discussed by Child (English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1882-1893, No. 49), and many American variants have been recovered. See Pound (American Ballads and Songs, 1922, p. 45), Tolman (JAFL 29, 1916, p. 158), Kittredge (JAFL 30, I9I7, p. 294), McGill (Folk-Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, 1917, p.54), Campbell and Sharp (English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians, 1917, No. 11), Cox (Folk-Songs of the South, 1925, p. 33), Davis (Traditional Ballads of Virginia, 1929, p. 146), Kirkland (Southern Folklore Quarterly 2, 1938, p. 65), Chappell (Folk-Songs of Roanoke and the Albemarle, L939, p. 17), Eddy (Ballads and Songs from Ohio, 1939, pp. 26-28), Linscott (Folk Songs of Old New England, 1939, p. 278), Treat (JAFL 52, 1939, p. 35), Belden (Ballads and Songs, 1940, pp. 33-34), Brewster (Ballads and Songs of Indiana, 1940, pp. 55-57), and Morris (Southern Folklore Quarterly 8, 1944, p. 121). It appears also in the forthcoming Brown (North Carolina Folk-Lore Society) collection.
C. The Two Little Boys. Sung by Mrs. Mildred Tuttle, Farmington, Ark., Dec. 31, 194I. Learned from her father, a Missourian, who called it "The Two Little Boys." It was originally a long piece, she said, "about a fool boy who murdered his brother with a pocketknife, just because he did not feel like playing baseball!"
Oh, two little boys were going to school,
Oh very fine boys were they,
On Friday evening they went home,
On Monday they went away.
Then Willie took out his pocket-knife,
It was very keen and sharp,
. . . .
He pierced his brother's heart.
Oh Willie, take off your hollow* gown
And tear it from gore to gore,
And wrap it around the bleeding place
So it may bleed no more.
So Willie took off his hollow* gown
And he tore it from gore to gore,
And he wrapped it around the bleeding wound,
But still it bled the more.
Oh Willie, when you go home tonight,
Mother'll ask you where I am,
Tell her I am gone to Heaven above,
Its pearls but to learn.
*holland?