13A- Wife Wrapped- Dennis (KY) 1922 (Child 277)
13A- THE WIFE WRAPPED IN WETHER'S SKIN
(Child No. 277)
Taken from a manuscript song book compiled by Miss Camilla Dennis from the singing of school children at Hindman, Knott County, Kentucky, 1922-23.
Hexatonic, Aeolian, with one major sixth.
I married me a wife, I got her home,
For gentle, for Jenny, my Rosamarie,
But I oftentimes wished I'd let her alone,
As the dew flies over the green valley.
When I come in it's from my plough,
"O now, my kind wife, is my dinner ready now?"
"There's a piece of bread upon the shelf,
If you want any more you can bake it yourself."
I get me a knife and I went to the barn,
And I out me a hickory as long as my arm.
Then I went out to my sheep pen,
And soon had off an old wether's skin.
I placed it on my old wife's back,
And made my hickory go whickety-wack.
"I'll tell my father and all my kin,
That you have hit me with a hickory limb."
"If you do, I'll tell you lied,
For I was a-dressing my old wether hide."
Then I come in it's from the plough,
"O now, kind wife, is my dinner ready now?"
She flew around, the board was spread,
And every word it was "Yes, sir! No, sir!"
In No. 13A the local title given for the variant coincides with the title in Child's compilatlon (Halpert).