A CRITICAL, BIBLIOGRAPHICAL STUDY OF THE TRADITIONAL BALLAD IN AMERICA- 1950 edition
[This is a great information source for Child ballads before 1950. In 1977 a revised edition was published, providing some new information for some of the ballads.]
A CRITICAL, BIBLIOGRAPHICAL STUDY OF THE TRADITIONAL BALLAD IN AMERICA
1. RIDDLES WISELY EXPOUNDED
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 4.29 / BFSSNE, X, 8; XII, 8 / R.P.T. Coffin, Lost Paradise. 199 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 59 / JAFL, XII, 129 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, z I Va FLS Bull, #10, 5.
Local Titles: Riddles Wisely Expounded, The Devil and the Nine Questions, The Devil's Nine Questions, The Nine Questions, The Three Riddles.
Story Types: A: A dialogue with, the speakers named. The Devil, on the threat of removing a girl to Hell, asks her what is whiter than milk, louder than a horn, higher than a tree, more innocent than a lamb, etc. The maid answers snow, thunder, Heaven, a babe, etc. and names the Devil. The latter then admits defeat. Examples: Davis.
B : The same sort of motif as that of Type A is used, but when the girl answers the questions and names the Devil, he says he will take her to Hell regardless. Examples: Niles.
C: A lesson in the way to get a lover. The Devil has become a cavalier, and there are three pretty maids in search of a man. The youngest, who knows the answers, wins the cavalier.
Examples : BFSSNE, X, 8.
Discussion: The Type A and Type B American texts, which are extremely rare, are closest to the Child A*, C, and D versions in their obvious concern with the Devil. (See Davis, Trd Bid Va^ 59 for a comparison of the Virginia texts with Child.) The song seems to have originally been a battle of wits between the Devil and a girl (cf. Child A*) which was first secularized and then rationalized. It was discovered late in America, first by Alfreda Peel, and printed by Davis with the Virginia Collection. (See Davis > Trd Sid Va^ 46 7 for an account of the discovery.)
The Type C text uncovered by Barry in New England traces back to Child Ad indirectly. See BFSSNE, XII, 9 where the history of the "cavalier" form of the ballad is given from d'Urfey's Pills to Purge Melancholy through the German translation by Herder (cf . Goethe's opera die Fischerin) back to an English re-translation by William Aytoun in Blackwood's Magazine, LVII, 173 5. Comparative texts and a discussion of this re-emergence of a folk song are given here.
Also check BFSSNE, X, 9 where the romantic and homelitic forms of this song are briefly discussed, and the idea that the Child F and Jones, jF-i Mich, 5 texts are members of the Captain Wedderburn's Courtship (46) tradition is expressed.
Elizabeth Cooke (JAFL, XII, 29) incorporates the riddle portion of the ballad in a story, The Bride of the Evil One, told her by a Martinique Negro from New Orleans. The girl in this story confounds Satan much as she does in the ballad.
The common American refrain is the "ninety-nine and ninety-weavers bonny" burden.
2. THE ELFIN KNIGHT
Texts: Jane G. Austin, Dr. Le Baron and his Daughter, 314 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 3 / Belden, Mo F-S, I / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 23 / Brown Coll / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 1 1 / Child, I, 19; V, 284 / Davis FS Va / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 3 / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 58 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 8 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 194 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 137 / Gray, Sgs Bids Me Vjks, 78 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 31 / JAFL, VII, 228 ; XIII, 120; XVIII, 49; XIX, 130; XXIII, 430; XXVI, 174; XXX, 284; LII, 14 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 169 / "Love Letter and Answer" (broadside in Harris Coll.,
Brown University), Hunts and Shaw, Boston / Morris, Fla F-S, 364 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, i / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, io/ PTFLS, X, 137; Randolph, OzF~S, I, 38 / Ring, NE F-S, 12 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 60 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, i / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 134 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 129 / Songs for the Million (c, 1844): "Love's Impossibility" / SFLQ, VIII, 135 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtchs, 423.
Local Titles: A True Lover of Mine, Blow Ye Winds Blow, (The) Cambric Shirt, Every Grove is Merry in Time, Go and Make Me a Cambric Shirt, Go Marry in Time, I Want You to Make Me a Cambric Shirt, Mother Make Me a Cambric Shirt, Oh Say Do You Know the Way to Salin?, Redio-Tedio, Scarborough Fair, Strawberry Lane, The Two Lovers.
Story Types: A: A man imposes tasks centering about the making of a cambric shirt upon a girl. She is to be acquitted of them and get her lover if she can answer with ones no less difficult. Hers usually deal with an acre of land. The elf, a carry-over in Child from some other ballad, is properly a mortal suitor.
Examples: Barry (B); Belden (A); Brewster (C)
Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr; Gardner and Chickering.
B: The story of Type A seems completely forgotten, and only a coy question-and-answer game between two lovers remains.
Examples: Linscott; Randolph (A); Shoemaker, Mt. Mnstly; SharpK (A, B).
C: A nonsense song, carrying the degeneration a step further than Type B, exists. Here, the Mother is told to make "me" a cambric shirt. Examples: Brewster (D).
Discussion: This ballad is the best remembered of the Child riddle songs both in America and Europe. However,, in this country, the elf, an interloper in Britain, has been universally rationalized to a mortal lover. Frequently, nothing remains but the riddle, sometimes even the love affair being absent. (See Child J, K, L, and my Types B and C.)
The common American refrains, as in Child, are the "rosemary and thyme- she will be a true lover of mine" and the "blow winds blow" types, though the New York (Thompson, Bdy Bts Bricks, 423), the Texas (PTFLS, X, 137), and other versions have choruses of nonsense words. For a discussion of the "rosemary and thyme" burden see JAFL, VII, 232. Also check Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgster, 10, where the line "she's worth a true lover of mine" is treated to show that worth is wyrth is the usual will be.
Riddles and riddle ballads in general, as well as the riddle in this song, are discussed in JAFL, VII, 230, while the American songbook versions are reviewed by Barry, JAFL, XXX, 284,
3. THE FALSE KNIGHT UPON THE ROAD
Texts: American Songster (Cozzens, N. Y.) / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 1 1 / Belden, Mo F-S, 8 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 29 / BFSSNE, XI, 8 / Charley Fox's Minstrel's Companion (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia): "Tell-Tale Polly" / Creighton, Sgs Bids NSc, i / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 61 / JAFL, XXIV, 344; XXX, 285 / The Only True Mother Goose Melodies (Monroe and Francis, Boston, 1833), 6 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 4.8 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #i / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 1 } I Fa FLS Bull, #7, 4.
Local Titles: False Fidee, The' False Knight, The False Knight on the Road, Fause Knicht and the Wee Boy.
Story Types: A: A child, sometimes a boy and sometimes a girl, is detained by the Devil or a "false knight". A number of questions are asked, but the child is ready with witty answers and eventually names the questioner. Little of the situation or setting is revealed in the dialogue. Examples: Brewster; Davis; SharpK (A).
B: The question-and-answer sequence is similar to that of Type A, but the child throws the questioner in a well at the end.
Examples: Belden, Pound.
Discussion; American texts of this song are quite rare, and it is Davis' opinion they emanate from Virginia (Trd Sid Va, 61) to a large extent. The Type A stories are generally close to Child A. The Type B songs, where the boy throws the questioner in the well, show a dramatic flourish which stretches logic to make "right" triumph fully.
The Nova Scotia (Creighton) version has a long and unique nonsense refrain added to an incomplete text, and Sharp (SharpK, Eng F-S Aplcbns, 1, 41 1) points out that the introduction "A Knight met a child in the road . . " in his Tennessee version is unusual. The Maine (BFSSNE, XI, 8) version is interesting in its fiddle sequence and the boy's final wish that the fiddle bow
will stick in his questioner's throat.
Gerould (MLN, LIII, 5967) advances the idea that the Davis (Va.) and the SharpK (N. C.) versions may be of Irish origin, although he states this is not likely in the case of the Northern and Western texts. Barry, (JBFSSNE, XI, 89) discusses the song as a homily and treats its European affiliations.
4. LADY ISABEL AND THE ELF-KNIGHT
Texts: Adventure, 1130 '23, 191 / American Songster (Cozzens, N.Y.), 212 / American Speech III, 1 14 / Barbeau, F-S Fr Canada, 22 (inFrench) / Barbour, 6 Slds Mo Oz Mts, #4 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 14 / Belden, Mo F-S, 5 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 31 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, I, 3 / Bull TennFLS, VIII, #3, 65 / Bull U SC#i6z, #i / Chappell, F-S Rnkc 'Alb, 12 / Charley Fox's Minstrel's Companion. (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia), 52 / Child, III, 496 / Child Mss., XXI, 4 / Cox, F-S South, 3 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, i / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 269; XLV, 240 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 61 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 62 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 36 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 6 / Fauset, F-L N Sc, 109 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 190 / Focus, IV, 161, 212 / Folk Lore Journal, VII, 28 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 31 / Gordon, F-S Am, 68 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newf, 3 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 32 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 61 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 10 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L,#i / Hummel, Oz F-S / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, XVIII, 132; XIX, 232; XXII, 65, 374; XXIII, 374; XXIV, 333, 344; XXVII, 90; XXVIII, 148; XXXV, 338, XXXVIII, 373 (prose); XLII, 2545 XLVIII, 305; XLIX, 213; LII, 20 / Journal of III. State Hist. Soc., XXXI, 301 / Macintosh, So III F-S, 4 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 3 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 93 / Morris, F-S Fla, 366 / Minish Mss. / Narragansett Times, 1222 '44 / N.T. Times Mgz, 10 9 '27 / Niles, Bids Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds, 4 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 198 / PTFLS, X, 138 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 41 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 216 / Red, White and Blue Songster (N.Y., 1861), 212 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 60 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 43 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 126 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #z / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 6 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 97 / Summer
School News (Summer School of the South), 7 31 '14 / Va FLS Btdl 9 dfc& 24, 6 12 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, 82. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 30.
Local Titles: If I Take Off My Silken Stay, Lady Isabel and the Elfin Knight, Little Golden, Miss Mary's Parrot, My Pretty Colinn, Polly and William, Pretty Colendee, Pretty Collee, Pretty Nancy, Pretty Polly, Seven Sisters, Six Fair Maids, Six King's Daughters, Sweet Nellie, Sweet William, The Cage of Ivory and Gold, The False-Hearted Knight, The False Lover, The False Knight, The False Sir John, The King's Daughter, The Ocean Wave, The Outlandish Knight, The Pretty Gold Leaf (Lee), The Pretty Golden Queen, The" Salt Water Sea, The Seven (Six) King's Daughters, The Seventh King's Daughter, Willie Came
Over the Ocean, Wilson, Young Jimmie.
Story Types:
A: A knight, or other deceiver, convinces the seventh daughter to rob her family and elope with him. He leads her to the water where he has drowned her six sisters. When he requests her to remove her valuable robe (other objects may be added or substituted) before she dies, she makes him turn around that he may not see her naked. (Sometimes she
asks him to clear brambles or give her an opportunity to pray.) He complies, and she pushes him in the stream to drown. After she returns home and puts the money back, a parrot questions her concerning her activities. By the promise of an elaborate cage, she convinces him not to tell on her. Thus, when the king asks the parrot what the fuss is, he replies a cat has been
around his cage.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden (C), Davis (A), SharpK (F).
B: The same story as that of Type A is told, but the supernatural nature of the knight is still clear.
Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield (B)
C: The usual story is told, but the parrot accuses the girl of the murder because of stanzas borrowed from Young Hunting (68).
Examples: JAFL, XLIX, 213.
D: The usual story is told, but the parrot fails to deceive the girl's father, and the old man reminds the daughter that he had said she would rue her going away. Examples: JAFL, XXII, 374.
E: The usual story is told, but after the girl removes her cloak, the suitor drags her into the water first up to her ankles, then her knees, waist, and eventually neck. She grabs the horse's tail and somehow (a stanza is forgotten) the lover drowns. She escapes and returns home, where her mother and the parrot have the usual conversation about the cat.
Examples: Scarborough, On Trail N F-S.
Discussion: The story seems to be part of a large body of European tales. Child (I, 54) sets forth the hypothesis . . . that an independent European tradition existed of a half-human, half-demonaic being, who possessed an irresistible power of decoying away young maids, and was wont to kill them after he got them into his hands, but who at last found one who was more than his match, and lost his own lif e through her craft and courage. A modification of this story is afforded by the large class of Bluebeard tales.
Although Child rejects the idea (I, 53), the ballad may also be an off-shoot from the Judith-Holofernes story.
The ballad is still known in all Europe, and in nineteenth century England there were many stall versions. Belden, Mo F S, 5, divides the song into three scenes, as they were presented in these stall prints: the seducer cajoling the girl, the waterside, the parrot. Parodies of the song are also not uncommon. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 33 reports one from Maine containing the May Collin or Colvin name found in Child C, H, etc. and included in the printed Charley Fox's Minstrels Companion, Philadelphia, 1861.
Barry argues (Brit Bids Me, 34) that the song must have been an early arrival in America. The versions are invariable closer to Child C G than to A B, with the exception of Type E which is nearest, but not exactly like. Child B, In America, certain characteristics can be noted:
1. The girl and the parrot often have the same names in the ballad (Polly), which tends to confuse the story. (Macintosh, III. State Hist. Journal, XXXI, 302, prints a text that has "my pretty golin colleen " and not a parrot bribed to silence. This is another and similar confusion, although the informant refused to admit a parrot has a thing to do with the song. See p. 300.)
2. The supernatural character of the lover has completely vanished. (Niles, Bids Lv Sgs Igc Lgds, 4 prints a version under the local title the Elfin Knight, although there is nothing in the text to indicate supernaturalism in the lover's character.) See also Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 269. Wimberly, American Speech, III, H4ff., discusses this ballad with respect
to this point.
3. The girl is often a very vigorous person. She throws a rock at the drowning knight in SharpK, Eng F-S So Aflchns, B and threatens, rather than cajoles, the parrot in the Niles version just cited.
4. Substitutes for the "naked girl" excuse are often given in the form of "clearing the briars," "saying prayers", etc. These reveal a change for what may well have been, in certain early American cases, puritanical reasons. The JAFL,
XXIV, 334 version from Illinois-Missouri is notable in this respect, not only for the religious note in the request by the girl for a chance to pray, but also for her seeking the Lord's support in the murder she commits.
Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, p. 3ff. can be consulted for a detailed comparison of selected American texts. Brewster, Bids Sgs I-nd, 31, discusses the Indiana versions in some detail. He suggests that the name William, used for the seducer in some texts, may Ibe derived from villain. The slightly corrupt Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, text is also worth
study. Particularly unusual is the intrusion of the warning for the cock not to crow early (see Grey Cock, 248) which can be seen in the Minish Mss. This corruption was no doubt encouraged by the parrot stanzas. And the Flanders text, that appears in the Narragansett limes , 1222 '44, is notable because the incremental stanzas of Child C, D, and particularly E, in which the girl removes a series of garments, are retained. In this Rhode Island song, the maid takes off her gown, shoes, stockings, and smock at her lover's commands.
The story occurs as a prose tale, as well. Isabel Carter, J4FL, XXXVIII, 373, prints a mountain white version, "Old Notchy Road", from the southern Blue Ridge which employs the stripping and pushing motifs in relation to a pit and a habitual murderer. See also the folk songs The Jealous Lover and Pearl Bryan.
Note should be taken of the French-Canadian version (Barbeau, F-S French Canada, p. 22) which is different in story from the English-American versions. However, it derives from France and was brought over to Quebec by Frenchmen. Here Jeanneton kicks the man in the stream as he pulls off her stocking and cuts a limb off a tree to keep him under. He repents as he dies. This story has had no effect on American tradition to my knowledge.
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7. EARL BRAND
Note: References to secondary versions songs about a bold soldier and with a happy ending can be found under Erlinton, Child 8.
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 3 5 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 37 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, I, 4 / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 64 / Cox, F-S South, 1 8 / Cox, W. 7 a. School Journal and Educator, XLVI, 83 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 86 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 7 / Henry, Beech MtF-S, 10 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 36 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplchns, 45 / Hudson F-S Miss, 66 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 22 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L,#.z / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL XXVIII, 152; XLII, 256; XLVIII, 307 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 9 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 2,6, 60 / Morris, Fla F-S, 373 / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 154 / Minish
Mss. / MLN, XXV, #4, 104 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 191 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 48 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 221 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 114 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #3 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, 1, 14 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / SFLQ, VIII, 136 / Va FLS Bull, #s 2, 46, 10.
Local Titles: Fair Ellender, Lady Margaret, Lord Loving, Lord Robert, Lord William, Lord William and Lady Margaret, Rise Ye Up, Sweet William, Sweet William and Fair Eleanor, Sweet Willie, The Child of Ell, The Seven Brethren, The Seven Brothers, The Seven King's Sons, The Seven Sleepers.
Story Types:
A: A girl is carried off by her lover who, in some songs, spends the night with her first. Her father and seven brothers pursue them. The lover halts his flight and slays all eight. After the damage has been done, the girl tells him to hold his hand, and then, desperate and crushed, she continues on with him. Often a scene in which they stop to drink at a river
and the fatal bleeding of the lover stains the water is included. The song ends at his mother's house where they both die, he of wounds, she of heartbreak. Examples: Barry (A), Brewster (A), Davis (A), SharpK(A), FIg, VIII, 137.
B: The usual story has a stanza (perhaps from Barbara Allen) inserted so that the mother dies as well as the lovers.
Examples : Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLVI,83; SharpK(B).
C: The usual story is told as far as the fight. Then, on the death of her father, the girl turns against her lover and wishes him in the middle of the sea. Examples: Hudson, F-S Miss,
D : This text is similar to that of Type C, except that the lover becomes harsh with the girl after the fight and tells her if she does not like what he has done she can get another suitor. He tells her he wishes that she were back in her mother's room and he somewhere else. This ending is very abrupt.
Examples : Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplcbns.
Discussion: The Type A ballads follow the story of Child B, Scott's The Douglas Tragedy, a song that may well be based on a real Selkirkshire event as far as its detail goes. (See Davis, Trd Sid Va, 86 and Child, I, 99.) The Douglas Tragedy contains the rose-briar ending, although this feature is lacking in a large percentage of the American versions. None of Davis' Virginia collection has this motif, though SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, A, C contain it. Also, in the SharpK southern texts can be found the names Fair Ellender, Lord Thomas, in addition to the Barbara, Allen stanza (see Type B). These points indicate that Child 73 and 84 have both contacted this song.
Other American story types derive from varying causes. The girl's turning against her lover in Type C seems to be a combination of forgetting and sentimentality, while both this and the Type D versions tend to substitute a more active and less powerful dramatic scene for the pathos of the Type A ending. In Type D the change in tone after the father's death may well have come from the loss of a few key phrases somewhere in oral transmission. Compare the very similar lines as they exist in a Type A story (JJFL, XXVIII, 153) also from North Carolina where they have a pathetic tone.
In the American versions of the ballad the girl seldom, if ever, speaks before her father is slain. Also, the Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, A text is worth noting because of its extreme beauty and the interesting condensation of the end. The lovers never reach home, and the rose-briar lines are compressed. The A. C. Morris (SFLQ, VIII, 136) text differs from most American versions
in that the hanging of the bugle about William's neck is repeated. (See Child B.) For a complete description of leading American texts see Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 21.
The tale is not an uncommon one. Child's remarks (I, 88 ff.) concerning the Scandanavian counterpart Ribold and Guldborg are important" in this respect.
Reference should also be made to Child 8 (Erlinton) for the ballads called The Soldier's Wooing, etc. that are often printed as American secondary versions of Earl Brand or Erlinton. See Child 8 in this study.
8. ERLINTON
Note: There is no American text that can be for certain called a derivative of Erlinton.
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Af>, 377 / Belden, Mo F-S, 103 / Brewster, \B/<& Sgs 2nd, 40 / Boston Evening Transcript^ Notes and Queries^ 11 26 '21 / Brown Coll/ Bull TennFLS, II, #i, i / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 88 / Cox, F-S South, 375 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 2$ / Davis, Trd Bid Va. 92 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 14 / Flanders, Garl GnMtSg, 55 / Flanders, Vt
F-S Bids, 232 / Gardner & Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 380 / Henry, *F-S So*Hghlds, 185 / JAFL, XXI, 575 XXIII, 447; XXX, 363 ; XLV, 1 14 / Pound, Am. Bids Sgs, 68 / Randolph, OzF-S, 303 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns,#^i \ SharpK, EngF-S So\Aplchns, I, 333.
Local Titles: I'll Tell You of a Soldier, The Poor Soldier, The Soldier, The Soldier's Wooing, The Valiant Soldier.
Story Types: A: A soldier returns from war and courts a rich, fair lady against her father's wishes. The father and seven men attack them as they go to get married. The soldier fights bravely and is routing the assailants when the father offers to give up his daughter and a large sum of money. However, the girl refuses to let her lover stop the fight until the old man
offers all his wealth. She reasons that the fortune will be hers anyway if her father is slain. The father capitulates and takes the soldier home as his heir, more out of fear than agreement.
Examples: Belden; Randolph (A, B).
Disctission: There are a number of secondary versions of this ballad in circulation under the various "soldier" titles. However, the mood of these songs has become gay and humorous from tragic. Note the cold-bloodedness of the lady who willingly endangers her father's life in order to get the best bargain. This scene originates in the broadside texts. See The Masterpiece
of Love-Songs, in John Ashton's A Century of Ballads, 164 and the Roxburgbe Ballads, VI, 229, cited by Barry, JAFL, XXIII, 447. The outline of the tale, the elopement, and the lady who holds the horses and watches does, nevertheless, ally the American texts with Erlinton, or possibly Earl Brand.
See Gardner and dickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 380; Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 14; and Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 40. Also check Child (I, 88, 106) who finds it difficult to separate the British forms of the two traditional ballads. There is a similar "sailor" song in the English broadsides. See Roxburgh Ballads, VII, 559-
The reason for my treating these songs as secondary of Erlinton rather than Earl Brand lies in the happy conclusion which in its sentimental form could only derive from the Erlinton ending. It should be noted, however, that there is no imprisonment of the girl or strict watch over her in the "soldier" songs as is the case in Child 8.
These "soldier" texts offer an example of an American oral tradition that has sprung from corrupted British forms of an old ballad. It is not uncommon for such to be the case. See also The Brown Girl (295) and the majority of the Kniherine J'affray (221) texts.
--------------------10. THE TWA SISTERS--------------------------
Texts; Adventure, 9 10 '23, 191 / Barry, Brit Bids Me., 40 / Belden, Mo F-S, 1 6 / Botkin, Am Play-Party Sg, 59, 337 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 42 / Brown Coll / BFSSNJE, VI, 5 ; IX, 4; X, 105 XI, 16; XII, 10 / Butt Tenn FLS, IV, #3, 74; VIII, #3, 71 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb) 13 / Child, 1, 137; II, 508 / Child Mss., XXI, 10 / Christian Science Monitor, 12 2 '37 / Cox, F-S South, 20 / Cox, Trd Bid WFa,6t Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 428, 441 / Davis, Trd Bid Pa, 93 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 17 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 3 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 19 / Gray, Sgs Bids Me L'jks, 75 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 32 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 9 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 106 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 39 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 68 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 25 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L,#i I Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XVIII, 130; XIX, 233; XXX, 286; XLII, 238; XLIV, 295 ; XLV, i ; XLVIII, 306 / Kincaid, Fav Mt Bids, 22 / Morris, F-S Fla, 375 / Neal, Brown Cnty, 60 / N.T. Times Mgz, 109 '27 / Niles, More Sgs Hill-Flk, 8 / Niles, Anglo-Am Bid Stdy Bk,$6/ Perry, Carter Cnty, 98 / Pouncl, Am Bids Sgs, 1 1 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, I r / PTFLS, X, 141 / Raine, Land Sddle Bags, 118 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 50 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 2ii / Richardson, Am Mt Sgs, 27 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 164 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns,/ SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 26 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 2 / SFLQ, VIII, 138 / Stout, F-L la, i / Thomas, Blue Ridge Cntry, 152 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 70 / Thomas, Sngin Gathrn, 76 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtchs, 393 / Va FLS Bull,#S2%, 12.
Local Titles: All Bow Down, Bow Ye Down, I'll Be True to My Love, Lord of the Old Country, Sister Kate, The Miller and the Mayor's Daughter, The Miller's Two Daughters, The Old Farmer in the Countree, The Old Lord by the Northern Sea, The Old Man of (in) the North (Old) Countree, There Was an Old Farmer, There Was an Old Jaynor, (There Was an) The Old Woman (Who) Lived on the Seashore, There Was an Old Woman Lived in the West, The Swim Sworn Bonny, The Two (Three) (Little) Sisters, The Two Young Daughters, West Countree.
Story Types
A: A girl, jealous that a gentleman has courted her younger sister, invites the latter on a walk and pushes her in the water to drown. A miller robs the struggling girl, rather than rescuing her, and is punished by death for his crime. Capital punishment for the elder girl may or may not be mentioned.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden (C), Davis (A), SharpK (B).
B: Two princesses are playing by the water. The elder pushes the younger in. A miller finds the dead girl and makes a musical instrument from her body. The instrument reveals the murderer.
Examples: Barry (E), Davis (K), SharpK (K).
C: The usual story is started, but the musical instrument is made from the younger sister's body by the elder sister, and the instrument then names the murderer. This version has three-quarters of each stanza as refrain.
Examples: JAFL, XLV, 7.
D: A combination of Types A and B is sometimes found in which the instrument is made from the body, and both the miller and the elder girl are executed.
Examples : SharpK (A).
E: The usual story is started, but the drowned girl appears to make a harp of herself and reveal her murderer.
Examples: Henry, F-S So Hgblds (C).
F: The usual story is told, but the miller is left out. The girl in the water may plead with her sister to pull her from the "sea-sand" (quicksand ?) and be refused. Examples: Brewster (B, C), Neal.
G: An amazing version found in Newfoundland tells of the younger sister's shoving the elder sister in the water, although the younger has received more attention from the suitor. The body is fished out with a fishing pan, the face covered with lace and the hair full of golden lumps. A ghost tells the lover how his sweetheart was killed.
Examples: Greenleaf-Mansfield.
H: The usual story is told, except the elder sister bribes the miller to push the girl back into the water. Only the miller's hanging is mentioned.
Examples: Randolph, OzF-S (D).
I: The story is like that of Type A, except the miller is the father of the two girls and pushes his own daughter into the water.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (A).
J: The usual story is told, but the miller is the lover of the girls and seems to rescue the younger one after she has been pushed in.
Examples: JAFL, XVIII, 131.
K: A story similar to Type J is told, but after the rescue all go to church and "now they're (which two is not clear) married I suppose".
Examples: Thompson.
L: The story is like that of Type J, except that a prince courts the girls. The miller rescues the elder sister. She falls in love with him, and they marry.
Examples: Haun.
M: The usual story is told. However, the "fisherman", who has no previous connection with the girls, seems to rescue the drowning maid.
Examples: Cox, Trd Bids W 7 a (B); Perry.
N: Two little girls float down a stream in a boat. Charles Miller comes out with his hook and pulls one out by the hair and makes a fiddle of her body.
Examples: FSSN, XII, 10.
Discussion: This song still has a current tradition in Britain (Child, I, 118) and has more American story variations than any other ballad. In this respect it is an excellent subject for study. A monograph is reportedly being prepared on the American texts and their European affiliations, and Taylor (J4FL, XLII, 238 ff.) discusses the American, English, and Scottish versions
of the ballad. The latter article concludes that the American texts follow the English tradition (see p. 243) exclusively. The beaver hat, the failure to call the hair yellow, and the introductory stanza are all English traits. For the Scottish traits (not common to America) see pp. 238 40.
The extremely wide variation of story types in America can probably be traced to forgetting of details combined with attempts to rationalize either the presence or absence of the "harp" motif with the rest of the narrative. Certainly there has been no printed text that has frozen the story, as is the case in other songs. Note should be made, in connection with this point, of
the Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, B version ("Peter and Paul went down the lane") which is scarcely recognizable as the same song.
Perversions of the original such as my Types C, E, and G (cf . Child B and my Type C in connection with G) are the results of small changes in some detail of the narrative. However, they reveal the sort of change that might easily create a new story if enough momentum were gained. Type I has been melodramatized through similar small alterations of detail, probably with
the aid of forgetting. Types F and M are undoubtedly the results of omission of the ending in one of the other classes, though check the Cox, Trd Bids W Va, B text in which the miller is hung for pulling the girl to shore. Types J, K, and L have all been sentimentalized. J and K are certainly related to Child M, while K and L may echo the marriage feast that is present in the
Norse forms of the story. Types D and H refer to texts that are well-known, D combining Types A and B, while H is paralleled by Child S. (Under Type J, see Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 20 who quotes his informant as saying "that they (some forgotten lines) told how the miller and the cruel sister, who had together plotted the younger girl's drowning in an attempt to get possession
of property that had been left to her by her sweetheart, were hanged".) Type N resembles Type B in the use of the instrument motif, but seems quite corrupt at the start. Barry BFSSNE, XII, 10 theorizes on this text.
In general, the miller is present in American versions, although the gruesome musical instrument portion is lacking. (See Child Y and the whole Rff. group.) The elimination of such a supernatural motif is in keeping with the usual American practice, and the New World mood is on the whole lighter than the Old. Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 4 points out that texts where the girl gets capital punishment are less likely to degenerate into comedy than those where the miller is hung.
The refrains of the ballad have been given a great deal of attention. For discussions of them see Barry, BFSSNE> III, ii; Belden, Mo F-S, 16; Henry, F-S So Hg ds, 38; JAFL, XLV, 2 ("bow down" refrain); and Taylor, JAFL, XLII, 238. The usual American refrains are the "juniper, gentian, and rosemary" corruption, or a "bow down, etc. I'll be true to my love, if
my love'll be true to me" variation. Nonsense lines ("sing i dum", "hey ho, my Nannie") are also found, and Randolph prints a refrain "bonnery-0" which seems to come from "Binnorie, 0, Binnorie" (Child C). See also BFSSNE, IX, 4 and X, 10 and the Morris, F-S Fla, texts. The latter songs feature the word "rolling" in various combinations.
Botkin in his Am Play Party Sg, 59ff. discusses the refrain of the song and its use in the dance-game versions, and Thomas, Sngin Gatbrn, 79 describes the ballad as a Kentucky dance.
The song is often found utilizing the "bowed her head and swam" cliche so common to Child 286.
For a detailed discussion of a number of American texts, see Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, p. 30. Refer also to Barry* HFSSNE, III, 2 and XII, 10 for detailed treatments of the tradition of the song, especially in connection with Type N.
The ballad has been discussed in relation to the folk-motif of "the singing bones 5 '. See Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 4243 for a complete bibliography along this line. He also includes many Scandanavian references.
--------------------------11. THE CRUEL BROTHER-------------------------------------
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 431 (trace) / Brown Coll / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 87 / JAFL, XXVIII, 300 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 21 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #20 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 36.
Local Titles: The Cruel Brother, The Stabbed Sister.
Story Types: A: Three landlords woo a girl. The third wins her. He asks her father and mother for permission to marry her, but forgets the brother. As a result, the brother, John, stabs her to death as she mounts her horse to go to the wedding. The ending, like that of Edward, is a testament in which John is cursed.
Examples: Haun, SharpK (A).
B: The story is similar to that of Type A, except that the brother's permission seems to be obtained, and the murder to be instigated by the brother's wife. Examples: Pound.
Discussion: Both story types appear in Child (See A, B, etc.), but as is usually the case the American texts are shorter. Sharp (SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 412) points out that his North Carolina version originated in the west of England.
For a treatment of the intrafamily murder ballads and the place of the brother in the house, see Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 94. The suggestion of incest (Type B) may well be behind this song, The Two Brothers (49), and a few other Child stories.
The common American refrain, "rose smells sweet and gay", is probably a derivative of one of the British "rose" burdens (See Child A, F, I K).
-------------------12. LORD RANDAL--------------------------
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 46 / Belden, Mo F-S, 24 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 5 1 / Brown Coll/ BFSSNE, I, /BullUSC 162, /Chzpvdl /F-S RnkeAlb, 14.7 Child, I, 163 / Cox, F-S South, 23 / Cox, Trd Bid WVa /W7a School Journal and Educator, XLV, 266 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 105 / Decennial Publication, Univ. of Chicago, 1903, VII, 140 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 21 / Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 197 j Focus, III, 399; IV, 31, 100 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 35 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 30 / Harper's Mgz (May, 1915), 908 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, j% / Henry, F~S So Hghlds, 45 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 69 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #4 / Hummel, OzF-S / JAFL, XIII, 1155 XVI, 258; XVIII, 195, 303, 376; XXIV, 3455 XXIX, t57; XXX, 289; XXXV, 339; XXXIX, 8i; XLII, 257; XLIV, 302 / Kolb, Treasry F-S, 14 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 191 / Macintosh, F-S So III, 26 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 13 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 19 / MLN, XVII, 12 / MLR, XIV, 21 1 / AW Pbil, XXIX, 105 / Morm, F-S Fla, 379 / Musical Quarterly ', II, 127 / Narragansett Times, 2 2 '45 / Niles, .B&& Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds, 14 / Niles, Anglo-Am Bid Stdy Bk, 6 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 3 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, 9 / Outlook, LXIII, 121 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 63 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 215 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 178 / Sewanee Review, XIX, 3177 SharpC, EngF-S So Aplcbns, #6 / Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 38 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 144 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 139 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 101 / 7 a FLS uH, pz 5, 7 i r.
Local Titles: A Rope and Gallows, Billy Randall, Dear Willie, Durango, Fair Nelson My Son, Henry My Son, Jimmie Randall (Randolph, etc.), John Elzie, Johnny Randall (Rilla, Reeler, Ramsay, Riller, Reynolds, Ramble, Rillus, Randolph, etc.), Johnnie Randolph My Son, John Willow My Son, Lord Lantoun, Lord Ronald My Son, McDonald, Mother Make My Bed Soon, Poor Anzo, Randall (Ransel, etc.) My Son, Sweet William, Terence, The Cup of Cold Poison, Three Cups of Cold Poison, The Jealous Lover, The Poisoned Child, Tyranty (many spellings), Tyranty My Son, Uriar My Son, Where Have You Been to My Dear Son?, Willy Ransome, Wooing and Death of John Randal.
Story Types:
A: A man, through a dialogue with his mother, tells that he has spent the night with his sweetheart, eaten a poisoned supper, and is now sick. His dogs usually are revealed to have died from the leavings. In his last "bequests" the sweetheart is cursed and shown to be the murderer.
Examples: Belden (C); Cox, F-S South (A);
Davis (A); Reed Smith (A).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, except that the hero forgives his sweetheart and seems to remain faithful to her although he knows she has poisoned him. Examples: Davis (L).
C: Some versions name other persons than the sweetheart as the murderer. Henry (Randal's brother), grandmother, sister, stepmother, wife, grandpa, and even Randal himself has this role.
Examples: Barry (K, 0); Cox, F-S South (E);
Davis, p. 1189; Eddy (B, C); Gardner and dickering;
JAFL, XVIII, 201 ff.; Linscott.
D: There is a Massachusetts version in which Randal goes fishing and catches an eel which he cooks and eats by mistake. The dialogue consists of his mother's discovery of the fatal error.
Examples: Barry (N). -
E: The same story as that of Type A, except the sister and the sweetheart have conspired to kill Randal.
Examples: Shoemaker, Mt. Mnstly,
Discussion: This ballad has extremely long and varied European, British, and American traditions (See Child, 1, 151 ff. and Barry, Brit Bids Me, 611.). It is said to be the most popular purely traditional song in America, for there have been no pocket songster versions to aid its spread as has been the case of Barbara Allen and Lord Thomas and Fair Annet (See Barry, Brit
Bids Me, 65). In the texts, there are any number of detail variations, but the story itself has remained quite constant.
This song has been the subject of a large amount of study and research, most of it connected with the names given the hero (See Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 47 and Reed Smith, SC Bids, 56). The alliance of the Randolph family of Virginia and West Virginia with the story has been noted by Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 105, although Vance Randolph, Oz F-S I, 63 points out that the ballad was aligned with the Randolphs in the Old World as well. Check, too, Scott, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (1902 ed.), Ill, 51.) Scott also indicates in the same work the similarity of the story to that of King John's death. See the Child C "King Henry" type, retained in Cox, F-S South, E.
The poison used by the true-love is generally considered to be snakes, served as eels or fish (Child, I, 155), although frequently she may serve simply poison or some such corruption as "ale" (eel), or even the cold cakes and coffee of Cox, F-S South, H. (See JAFL, XVI, 259.) Toads and reptiles of other sorts are also used, and Barry, Brit Bids Me, 61 points out that
newts were, by many people, considered poisonous when eaten.
The death wished for the true-love is by "hell-fire and brimstone" (Cox, of cit., A) in most American versions, while the death of the hawks and dogs is often omitted.
The story groups do not vary in general character, although they change in mood and motive. The Type C ballads in which the grandmother is the villain are probably the results of influence by the Scottish Croodlin Doo texts (Barry, Br it Bids Me, 66) and in New England frequently refer to the man as Tyranti. Barry, op. cit., 71 2 deftly explains this grandmother intrusion into the American texts. He believes the Child J-0 series tells a story in which a stepmother poisons a boy with small fish, and the dying youth is questioned by the ghost of his natural mother. This incident became rationalized as people ceased to believe in ghosts, and the grandmother and the natural mother herself were substituted into the narrative. Once this had happened, other members of the family might have slipped in. Type D he feels was "communally recreated" from Type C. Reed Smith in his chapter "The Road Downhill" in SC Bids, 64 prints a Poor Anzo version that is unbelievably corrupt and that should be studied carefully as the extreme of transmission degeneration. Besides the new name of the hero, the mother's questions mean little: "What did you leave your father (etc.) for, Anzo, my son ?" His reply that he has this or that is equally pointless. When asked why he left his sweetheart Anzo says, "Here is a red hot iron will broil a bone". Finally the mother wants to know what
he'll have for supper, and his reply, "Make me a little breely broth soup" is a consistent close. No mention is made of Anzo's having been poisoned.
Other deviations and corruptions of note are: i. Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 145 prints a footnote indicating that the Type E version from Pennsylvania has a funeral and a bequest for an unborn child. 2. The Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 197 text has the lad give nothing at all to his mother and "hell, etc." to the sweetheart, which might possibly be a transfer of the Edward theme of maternal instigation through the similarity of endings. However, it is just as likely not. 3. Niles, Bins Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds, 14 prints a version that has the final request of "Randal" that he be laid at his grandfather's son (probably uncle here) ? s side.
Taylor, Mod Phil, XXIX, 105 points out that the hunting in the greenwood and the meeting the true-love are incompatible and suggests the former is a contamination that occurred in Britain, possibly from The King's Dochter Lady Jean. This contamination then has become deeply rooted in 12.
For remarks on the relationship of this ballad to Billy Boy see Linscott, F-S Old NE, 1 66 and Sharp, 100 English Folk-Songs, p. xxxiv. For an analysis of a South Atlantic States "poor buckra" text see C. E. Means, Outlook, Sept. 1899, 121. Jane Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 41 ff . discusses a number of American texts in great detail.
13. EDWARD
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 433 (trace) / Brown Coll / CFLQ, V, 300 / Cox, Trd Bid W Fa, ii / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 120 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 23 / Focus, III, 398, 399 / Gordon, F-S Am, 567 Harm, Cocke Cnty, 89 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 70 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #5 / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XXXIX, 93 / Morris, F-S Fla, 381 / Niles, Anglo-Am Stdy Bk, 10 / N.T. Times Mgz, 10 9 '27 / Owens, SW Sings, n. p. (2 texts)/ Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 16/ Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 23 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 67 / Randolph, OzMtFlk, 207; Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 180 / Sewanee Review, XIX, 313 / SharpC, EngF-S SoAplcbns, #7 / SharpK,
Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 47 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / SFLQ, IV, 13 / Taylor, Edward and Sven I Rosengard, 80 / Ft. Historical Society, Proceedings, N.S., VII, 1939, 102 / Fa FLS Bull, #s 2-4, 6, 9- 10.
Local Titles: Blood on the Lily-White Shirt, Edward, How Come (What Is) That Blood on Your Shirt Sleeve?, How Come That Red Blood on Your Coat?, Ronald, The Cruel Brother, The Little Yellow Dog, The Murdered Brother, What Blood on the Point of Your Knife?, What Is That on the End of Your Sword?, What Is That on Your Sword So Red?
Story Types:
A: A man has committed fratricide (sometimes patricide or killed his brother-in-law), and his mother by steady questioning eventually gets from him the facts of the crime along with a statement that he is fleeing the land never to return. No implication of the mother herself is indicated.
Examples: CFLQ, V, 300; Davis (A); Scarborough (A).
B: In the version that is half The Twa Brothers and half Edward (see Type E of Child 49), the mother is implicated. However, the implication makes little sense in this "new" story, as we are told earlier that the killing is the result of spontaneous anger and frustration during the fight.
Examples: Ft. Historical Society, Proceedings.
Discussion: Unlike Child A, B the American texts (excepting Type B) do not implicate the mother in the crime. This characteristic and the New World emphasis on fratricide (Child A) rather than patricide (Child B) reveals a close relationship of the American tradition with what Taylor (see Edward and Sven I Rosengard, 1931) feels is the original form of the song.
Most of the original story has been lost, however, in Britain, America, and Scandanavia. Nevertheless, because the ballad is continually associating itself with incest songs (see Child 49 and 51) and because incest is a theme that might well vanish from such a story, an intraf rfmily fixation is probably the cause of the crime in the older, now lost, texts. See WF, VIII, 314 19.
See Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 52 for a discussion of a few American texts and Taylor, op. cit., for a definitive treatment of the whole tradition of the song. Taylor includes a large number of American, British and, translated Scandanavian variants, pp. 59 in.
Helen H. Flanders (Vt. Historical Society, Proceedings, N. S. VII, 102) prints a song under the title Edward (Child 13). This text is actually a version of The Twa Brothers which has been corrupted by Edward. Child, I, 167 discusses the habits of Edward with respect to other songs.
Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 24 notes that this song was frequently used as a children's game in nineteenth century Missouri.
One of the oddest changes in the American forms of the song occurs in the SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, E text where the name Edward has become attached to the murdered brother. See footnote, I, 49*.
14. BABYLON
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 72 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, VII, 6 / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII,, #3, 69 / Child, III, 5 / Davis, FS Va / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 10* Local Titles: Baby Lon, Hecky-Hi Si-Bernio, The Bonny Banks of the Virgie 0,
Story Types: A: Three girls go out to walk or to "pull flowers", and on their way they meet a robber. He kills two of them, and, when the third wishes her brothers were there or says her brother is near-by, he questions her and finds out he has slain two of his sisters. After the discovery, he kills himself.
Examples: Butt lenn FLS, VIII, #3, 70;
Geenleaf and Mansfield.
B: The same situation occurs. The man seizes the eldest of the three girls and asks her to be "young Robey's wife". When she refuses, he stabs her to death. After he has done the same to the second girl, the third kills him.
Examples: BFSSNE, VII, 6.
Discussion: This ballad is quite rare in America. The Type A versions follow the Child A story, although the Barry text from Maine (a fragment) seems to belong to Child F and may have been preserved through the singing of tinkers and gypsies. Also, the Newfoundland text, besides condensing twelve stanzas into four so that the number of girls is not clear, mentions
two brothers (Child F) instead of one. In Tennessee, the brother's name is Baby Lon, and the "pulling flowers" for a talisman is retained at the start (see Child A).
The Type B ballad is unique to America and is another example of the self-sufficient woman entering the folk song. See Child 14 F and # 4 (SharpK, Eng F~S So Aplcbns, B).
The refrains vary. Two that give the title to the song (see Child A) are the Newfoundland "too ra lee and a lonely 0-On the bonny, bonny banks of Virgie, 0" and the New York (BFSSNE) "hecky-hi Si Bernio-On the bonny, bonny banks of Bernio".
MacKenzie (J4FL, XXV, 184) prints a song called Donald Munro in which a father unknowingly kills his sons and which MacKenzie feels is "vaguely reminiscent" of Babylon.
17. HIND HORN
Tezts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 73 / Greenleaf and Mansfeild, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 12. Local Titles: The Beggarman, The Old Beggar Man.
Story Types: A: Horn gives his love a watch and in return is given a ring that will shine when she is true and turn pale when she is in love with another. He sets sail for foreign shores. On arriving abroad, he notices the ring to be pale, and so he returns home at once. He meets a beggar who tells him his sweetheart is to be married on the morrow. Then he borrows the beggar's clothes and listens to instructions on how to act in his disguise. (He can beg from Peter or Paul, but need not take anything from anybody except his bride.) After gaining admittance to the wedding feast, he gets a glass of wine from the bride and slips the ring into it. She, of course, wants to know where he got it. He tells her the truth, and she swears to be his fore-
vermore, even though he is a beggar. They flee, and he reveals his disguise.
Examples: Barry (A), Greenleaf and Mansfield.
B : (from recollection, but no text) The story follows the narrative outline of Type A, but Horn takes the beggar with him and sends him on errands Horn does not wish to handle himself. Horn finds his lady married and kills her husband in a duel. She goes abroad to forget her sorrows and dies there*
Examples: Barry, p. 79 (no text).
Discussion: The Type A texts represent an unusual form of Child G, a ballad of Scottish origin that is well-known in Ireland. Type B is noted without text in Barry, Brit Bids Me, 79 as an extended version recalled by a sea-captain as having been sung by his men. If his memory is reliable, there seems to be both corruption from an outside source and degeneration present.
This man also claims to have heard another, and now lost, ballad based on a different portion of the Horn legend and called The Beggar Man. See Barry, op. *., 479.
Note Walter R. Nelles (JAFL, XXII, 42 ff.) for a critical study of the Hind Horn story in balladry. This article also deals with Kitcbie-Boy (252) on p. 59ff. Child and Nelles both consider the latter to be an offshoot of the Horn legend. Check the chart on p. 59.
18. SIR LIONEL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bid Me, 434 (trace) / Belden, Mo F-S, 29 / Boletin Latino Americano de Mitsica, V, 278 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 125 / Focus, IV, 48 / JAFL, XIX, 235 ; XXV, 175 ; XXX, 291 5 LIV, 84 / Lorn ax and Lomax, Our Sngng Cntry, 149 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 79 / MLR, XI, 396 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 72 / Elizabeth M. Roberts, The Great Meadow (N.Y., 1930), 151, 281, 298 / Scarborough, On frail N F-S, 51 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 191 / Sharp C, EngF-S So Aplcbns, #8 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplcbns, I, 55 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 4 / Va FLS Bull, #s 3-5, 9.
Local Titles: (Old) Bangum and the Boar, Bingham, Brangywell, Old Bang* em, Ole Bangum.
Story Types: A: Bangum and his lady are in a forest. Bangum mentions a man-eating hog known to the vicinity and sometimes blows his horn to attract the beast. The boar comes rushing out, and Bangum slays him with a knife, usually wooden. The mood of the adventure is mock serious. Some versions do not mention the lady; some have the boar kill a number of Bangum's retinue; others have the boar run away after a long battle; and still others tell of a cave in which lie the bones of many slain men. In a number of these texts the winning or losing of "shoes" is mentioned by Bangum.
Examples: Davis (A); Roberts, p. 281; Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mis.
B : Bangum rides into a wood and meets a maid. He proposes to her, but she refuses him. He then tells her of a man-eating boar in the forest and sets out to kill it. After a successful fight, he returns to the girl. She accepts a second proposal. Examples: Lomax and Lomax.
Discussion: All the American texts show a great deal of variation from the Child versions of the story. In the history of Sir Lionel one can see the complete degeneration of a romance into a burlesqued backwoods song. The original form of the story was probably Sir Eglamour of Artois (See Child, I, 209), and the British ballads retain much of the mood of this and other like
works. The composite story of the British texts as given by Davis, Trd Bld Va, 125 from Child, I, 208 appears in the introductory description of variation at the beginning of this work.
The American versions (see Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 57ff.) reduce the story to little more than a fight with a boar, in Type A with mere mention of the lady. The whole mood is changed. The pageantry is gone. The details of the old tale are forgotten. And the song that survives is, at most dignified, mock serious in tone. Perhaps the change of the refrain best illustrates this, the typical Child A lines "blow thy horne good hunter as I am a gentle hunter" becoming "cubbi ki, cuddle dum, killi quo quam", etc. Similar refrains are paralleled in English versions collected since Child's day, however. Check JAFL, XXX, 292.
It is notable that the Type B text retains a great deal more of the original story, if not any more of the original spirit, than do those of Type A. In addition, Barry, Brit Bids Me, 134 notes that a Maine sea-captain recognized thirteen stanzas of Child A.
Kenneth W. Porter (JAFL, LIV, 84) states that "wooden knife" is a corruption of the "wood-knife" used by huntsmen to carve game, etc. The misinterpretation of course came as the implement passed from use.
Belden, Mo F-S, 29 suggests that there may be a broadside original for the Missouri (at least) texts, but he has no proof.
For a treatment of the influence of A Frog Went a-Courtin' on Sir Lionel in America read Zielonko, op. cit., p. 5yff.
19. KING ORFEO
Reed Smith lists this ballad among the Child ballads surviving in America in SFLQ, I, #2, 9 ii. See Davis, FS 7 a.
20. THE CRUEL MOTHER
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, So / Boletin Latino Americano de Musica, V, 279 / BFSSNE, VIII, 7 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 3 / Cox, F-S South, 29 / Cox, W Va School Journal and Educator, XLVI, 64 / Davis, ?rd Bid Va, 133 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 24 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 15 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 47 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, XXV 183 ; XXXII, 503 / JFSS, II, 109 / Kennedy, Cultural Effects, 320 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs NSc, 12 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 104 / McGill, .F-S Ky Mts, 83 / Morris, F-S Fla, 384 / NTFLO, IV, #i, 36/Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, 18 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 73 / Randolph, The
Ozarks, 185 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 169 / SharpC, Eng F-S SoAplchns, / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 57 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / SFLQ, VIII, 139 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 6 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtchs, 447 / Va FLS Bull, #s 3 5. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 38.
Local Titles: Down by the Greenwood Side (Shady), Fair Flowers of Helio, Greenwood Side, Greenwood Society, The Cruel Mother, The Greenwood Siding, The Green Woods of Siboney-O, The Lady of York, The Three Little Babes, There Was a Lady Lived in York.
Story Types: A: "Leaning her back against a thorn", a woman bears her father's clerk two (or more) illegitimate children. These babies she murders with a pen-knife, buries, and deserts. Later, she sees some children playing ball. She tells them that if they were hers she would treat them in fine style. However, they inform her that they are the children she bore and murdered and usually tell her she is fated to dwell in Hell.
Examples: Barry (A); Cox, F-S South (A); Davis (A).
B : Sometimes an additional group of stanzas is found on a Type A version in which the mother is told the penance she must do for her crime. She must spend twenty-one years ringing a bell and existing in various bestial forms. In some texts the mother expresses a preference for such a fate over that of going to Hell.
Examples: Creighton; MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc; Thompson.
Discussion: The full story of this song frequently appears in American texts, although there are many that omit the antecedent action which reveals who the girl's lover is and the details of the birth and crime. Those that are wholly dialogue are clear enough if the original story is known. Type A stories are similar to the Child A H texts, while Type B versions follow Child I-L.
There is a great deal of folk superstition included in the various American texts of the ballad. The binding of the children's feet to keep the ghosts from walking is discussed in L. C. Wimberly's Folk-Lore in the English and Scottish Ballads, 254. (See Child H; Cox, F-S South, B; SharpK, F; and SFLQ, XIII, 139 for examples). Many versions contain a c *MacBethian" attempt to wash the blood from the knife after the crime, and there is an attempt to throw the knife away which results in its coming nearer and
nearer in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. (See Creighton and MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc.) The idea that the mother can gain redemption by being a fish, a beast, and a belltoller, etc. for seven years has come into this song from The Maid and the f aimer (Child 21). See Child, I, 218 and my Type B.
Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, goff. discusses the minor variations and distribution (check particularly in this connection the "garter" discussion by Barry in Brit Bids Me, 91 ff .) in American versions, while Davis, Trd Bid Fa, and Cox, F-S South, carefully relate their texts to those in Child. SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, B seems to take its initial stanza from The Wife of Usher's Well (79) and, with his L and BFSSNE, VIII, 7 contains the names Peter and Paul. The Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtchs text implies that poverty is one of the reasons for the killing of the children.
Zielonko, op. cit., 63, in her discussion of 20, notes that the American methods of telling the story are three in number, as is the case with the Child texts: direct narrative (Child A C, F I and Barry A, C, F); indirect narrative (Child K L and Davis A B); and a combination of the two methods (Child D, E, J, N and Barry B). See also Barry's discussion in BFSSNE, VIII, 7 concerning the number of children and the saints, traits which may reveal influence from Dives and Lazarus (56).
22. SAINT STEPHEN AND HEROD
See the Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N.S., VII, 7398-
24. BONNIE ANNIE
Barry, (BFSSNE, X, II and XI, 9) printed two Maine fragments which he believed belong to Child 24, Bonnie Annie. The very lines,
Captain take gold, and captain take money
Captain take gold, but leave me my honey. -X, ii.
cannot be found in the Child texts, but may well be from an American version of the Jonah-like story about the girl who elopes with her lover, only to be cast off the floundering ship in a storm. However, the second set of lines,
He kissed her cold lips a thousand times o'er
And called her his darling, though she was no more. -XI, 9.
belong to the Robson-Colwell comic ballad, Fillikins and his Dinah. The informant did place them in the same song with the first two lines, and Barry (XI, 9 10) attempts to rationalize this as corruption. My opinion is that such fragments are too brief to prove much.
25. WILLIE'S LYKE-WAKE
See the Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N.S., VII, 73 98.
26. THE THREE RAVENS (THE TWA CORBIES)
Texts: Barry, rit Bids Me, 435 (trace) / Belden, Mo F-S, 31 / Botkin, Am Play-Party Sg, 63 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, S3 1 Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 76 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 15 / Chelsea Song Book, 31 / Christy's New Songster and Black Joker (cop. 1863), 58 / Cleveland's Compendium, Philadelphia, (1859) / Cox, F-S Soutb, 31 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 137 /
Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 198 / Focus, V, 279, 281 / Frank Brower's Black Diamond Songster (cop. 1863), 3 / Frank Converse's Old Cremona Songster (cop. 1863), 56 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 102 / Heart Songs, 485 / Henry, F-S So HgUds, 48 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 72 / Hudson, F-T Miss, i / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, # 6 / Jones, F-L Mick, 5 / JAFL, XX, 1 54; XXXI, 273; XLV, 8 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 289 / McCill University Song Book (Montreal, 1921), 94 / Morris, F-S Flo, 387 / Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, 7 / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 23 / PTFLS, VII, no / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 74 / Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 194 / Scottish Student's Song Book, 268 / Singer's Journal, I, 239 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, # 10 / SharpK, Eng F-S So dplchns, I, 63 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 276 / Stout, F-L la, 2 / Fa FLS Bull, #s 4, 5, 710 / Wake's Carmina Collegensia (Boston, cop, 1868), 26 / Wetmore and Bartholomew, Mt Sgs NC, 10.
Local Titles: The Crow Song, The Three (Two) Ravens, The Two (Three) Crows, The Twa Corbies, Three Black Crows.
Story Types: A: Two or three carefree crows wonder what they will have for supper. The corpse of a horse, or some other animal, is spied in a near-by field, and in the spirit of revelry they fly down for a feast.
Examples: Brewster (A), Davis (A), Stout (A).
B: Two birds on a tree wonder where they can dine. One remarks that a ship went down by the seashore and that he plans to go there. The other says he knows of a sweeter meal a knight who has been slain. Only the knight's hawk, hound, and lady know the man is lying there. All three are away, the lady with another lover. The birds plan their feast, while the last
six lines tell of the cold bare grave of the knight in Anglo-Saxon style. This is the original Twa Corbies type.
Examples: JAFL, XLV, 10; Shoemaker.
C: The Type B story is told, except that the English Three Ravens text is followed in that the hawks and true-love remain faithful. The girl dies at dawn. Examples: Stout (E).
D: The two crows decide to eat a newly-born lambkin lying by a rock. A bird overhears the plan, goes to rouse the lamb, and tells him to flee. There is a moralistic, sentimental close.
Examples: JAFL, XX, 154.
E: A lyric song is sung by a girl of a lover who went to war in the Lowlands and now lies there known only to his horse and his "Lady Marie". He will sleep there, but she must grieve. There is no crow dialogue, and the mood is tragic.
Examples: Niles.
Discussion: The American versions of this song lack, in general, the dignity and feeling or cynicism of the English and Scottish versions. Except for the few texts in Types B and C, and the corrupted Type E, there are no human actors in the New World. The ballad has become an animal song, degenerated and parodied. (For its relations to the minstrel stage refer to Kittredge,
JAFL, XXXI, 273. Also check Davis, Trd Bid Va, 145 and Cox, F-S South, 31 for notes on the comic degeneration of the ballad.)
Keys to the general spirit of almost all the American texts are the refrains ("Billy Magee Magaw"; "Caw, Caw, Caw"; "Skubaugh"; etc. in place of the "hey down, hey derry day" and "sing lay doo and la doo and day" of Child B) ; endings such as the stock lines "Oh maybe you think there's another verse, but there isn't" on Brewster, BUs Sgs Ind, A; the interpolations
of cures, "cracker-barrel philosophy," and politics (See Davis, Trd Bid Va, C, G; Haun, Cocke Cnty, 102) ; and the sentimentality of Type D. The rationalization that the horse has been slain by a butcher (Randolph, Oz F-S, A) carries the whole thing one step further. See also Davis, op. cit., F, M where the horse becomes a "pig with a glass eye" and where a "quack, quack" refrain can be found.
There are a few texts in existence in America that retain the spirit of the Child versions. One Iowa song follows the English tradition, of the faithful girl. The others (Type B) probably owe their existence to the inclusion of a Twa Corbies text in Cleveland's Compendium (1859). Shoemaker found this form in Pennsylvania, and Barry located a Maine sea-captain who recognized seven of the ten Child stanzas. However, this man remembered a rescue of the knight directed by the ravens and a subsequent return to health by the warrior.
The degenerated forms that I have used as Types D and E are not related to anything in Child. The sentimental rescue of the lambkin in D reminds one of the ending Barry's sea-captain claimed for the song. The absence of the crows and the confused story of Type E seem to indicate corruption, though there is a moving lyric-tragic tone to this text.
Mention should be made of the extensive study of the ballad and its English and Scottish variants in Hermann Tardel's Zwei Liedstudien, /. Die engliscb schottiscbe Rolen Ballade, Beilage zum Jahresheit des Realgymnasiums zu Bremen. See also Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, /iff.
For a description of the ballad as a play-party game see Botkin, Am Play-Party Sg, 63.
27. THE WHUMMIL BORE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 437 (trace) / JAFL, XX, 155.
Local Titles: None used.
Story Types: A: A servant of the King tells of the only time he has seen a certain lady nude. He looked at her through a small hole while her maids were dressing her. Among other things, he tells how sad she looked, of the "tike" that was biting her shoe, and of the beauty of her hair, the rings on her hands, and her bosom. In a wistful close, he remarks that he can never
know more of this lady.
Examples: JAFL, XX, 155.
Discussion: This American version is close to the Child text, although it is longer and has different details. The ballad is extremely rare in this country. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 437 reports that a Maine sea-captain recognized the motif and the chorus.
31. THE MARRIAGE OF SIR GAWAIN
The only known traces of this old romance-ballad in America are derivative songs that can scarcely be called versions. Typical is the Barry, Brit Bids Me 382 text entitled the Loathly Bride ', which alters the story considerably. In the original the girl suffers under a "hex" that keeps her ugly until she can find a man who will treat her courteously in spite of her haggishness. In the derivative she purposefully disguises herself as a hag to test a foolish vow her lover has made. In a rash moment, he has sworn to marry the first woman he meets who will have him. The grace of the old song has vanished, and the mood has become comic. There is no riddle to answer in exchange for King Arthur's life, and the sacrifice of Gawain to the hag is lacking.
Of the same sort is The Half-Hitch printed in Sturgis and Hughes, Sgs Hills Ft, 50 and Flanders, 7t F-S Bids, 236.
32. THE LAILY WORM AND THE MACHREL OF THE SEA
Reed Smith lists this ballad among the Child ballads surviving in America. See SFLQ, I 9 $2, 9 n. I have not, however, been able to locate a published text.
37. THOMAS RYMER
Texts: Brown Coll.
Local Titles: True Thomas.
Story Types: A: True Thomas is lying on a hill when a lovely lady in grass green clothes rides up. She takes him up behind her on her horse, and they speed off. Eventually they come to a garden, where Thomas eats of some fruit. The woman then promises to show him "fairies three", and after dressing him in green and silver she takes him away to elf-land for seven long
years.
Examples: Brown Coll.
Discussion: This text, which is to be published with the F. C. Brown North Carolina Collection, is unique to America as far as I know. The ballad itself (See Child, I, Siyff.) goes back to a fifteenth century romance concerning a thirteenth century seer who was given prophetic power by the Queen of the Elves. In North Carolina, the story follows Child A without too much
deviation. The first four stanzas of the American version parallel Child A, stanzas i, 2, 6, and 8. Two lines of North Carolina Stanza 5 are almost exactly like Child A, Stanza n, while North Carolina Stanza 6 parallels Child A Stanza 16.
38. THE WEE, WEE MAN
Texts: Brown Coll.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: A man out walking encounters a little fairy, no bigger than his ear, but strong "as any buck". The man picks the elf up, and, after watching him throw a huge stone far away, goes along a lane with the little fellow until they come to a castle. Here a lovely lady comes out and wishes to "rassle". They go to bed, and after a night of sport the man awakes to find both his love and the elf-man gone.
Examples: Brown Coll.
Discussion: This version of Child 38 does not follow any of the texts given by Child in his collection, although its first five stanzas are generally the same as the corresponding parts of all seven British stories. North Carolina Stanzas 6, 7, 8, and 9 are, however, a vulgarization and rationalization of the fairy-lore found in the final lines of the Child texts. In fact. Stanza 6 was so crude that the informant refused to sing it to the collector. (A note on the manuscript reads, "One stanza Mr. S. censored here, a description of the girl's physical qualities. He didn't know me well enough".) As will be noted with the publication of the F. C. Brown North Carolina Collection and the appearance of this text in print, there is a great deal of localization and modernization of the old lines in this unique American version.
39. TAM LIN
Texts: Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 250.
Local Titles: Tam Lane.
Story Types: A: Tam Lane (who has been wooed away to the land of the fairies as a lover of the Queen of Elves) appears to Lady Margaret while she is pulling roses in Cartershay (Carterhaugh). He seduces her. When she wishes to know if he is a "Christian knight" he tells her of his plight and that, because the fairies pay a tithe to Hell every seven years, he wants to
return. In order to bring him back to be a father to her child, Lady Margaret is to go to the crossroad and pull the rider from the white steed as the fairy folk ride by. She does this and wins the knight, though the Fairy Queen is extremely irritated and tells Tarn Lane what would have happened to him had she known his plans. (The holding of the knight through various horrible
shapes that the fairies cause him to take and the throwing him in the well are lacking, while the fatherhood of Tam in respect to the girl's baby is not clear.)
Examples: Scarborough.
Discussion: Except for the melody and the first stanza which were given to the informant by Elinor Wylie, this text can not be fully accepted as part of the American tradition of the Child ballads. See Scarborough, Sgctchr So MtSy 250 I. The story given follows the Child narrative rather closely.
For a discussion of the folklore centering about the well, Carterhaugh, the fairies and earth-maiden, as well as the crossroads, and for a history of the story see Child, I, 33Sff.
40. THE QUEEN OF ELFAN'S NOURICE
Texts: JAFL, XX, 155.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: This text is almost a lyric and concerns a girl who hears, an elf-call in the form of a cow low telling her to come and nurse an elf-child under the sea. When asked by tlie elf-king why she moans, she says not for her breakfast, but for her lover whom she will never more see.
Examples: JAFL, XX, 155.
Discussion: The story and the speakers in this text do not become clear until one reads Child's discussion (I, 358). Here it is explained that the girl has been abducted by water-sprites a few days after she has had a baby in order that she may suckle an elf bairn. The girl is told she can expect to be returned to her Christian home as soon as the young elf is able to walk.
The American text is not far from Child's version, but it is not close either. It certainly is abbreviated.
42. CLERK COLVILL
See the discussion of Lady Alice (Child 85).
43. THE BROOMFIELD HILL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 438 (trace) / Child, I, 390, ftnte / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 127 /
Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 53 / JAFL, XXIV, 14.
Lokal Titles: Green-broom, Green Broom Field.
Story Types: A: Wagering that she can go to a tryst with a knight in the broomfield a maid and return a maid still, a girl sets out to meet her lover. In the field she finds him asleep beside his hawk. She scatters broom over his head and feet to insure his remaining asleep and hides to see what he will do upon waking. He soon rises and scolds his hawk for not letting him know
that his sweetheart was near, saying that had he known he would have had his will of her. He then starts to pursue the girl, but is told she has fled too swiftly to be caught.
Examples: Combs.
B: This type differs from Type A in that the bet is actually made by the girl and her lover in the ballad. The man tells his parrot to wake him should he be asleep in the field when his love arrives. When he learns that he has been duped he is willing that "all the birds in the broomfield feast on her heart's blood".
Examples: Henry.
Discussion: The story is not clear in the Type A version. In the Child British texts the girl has a rendezvous with a knight which she is afraid to keep for fear of being seduced and afraid to miss because of her lover's wrath. A witch offers a solution by pointing out that she will find her lover asleep, can prolong this state by spreading blossoms on him, and leave her ring as a token she has been there. In Child the deceived knight scolds his horse and his hawk, and they defend themselves.
The bet, made in the Type B version, also appears in the Child D F series, and the story is clear in this American text, but the lines are less lyric than the Combs song.
For a discussion of the means used by the girl to prolong her lover's sleep, as well as for a treatment of the use of drugs and runes in European stories, see Child, I, 391 ff.
MacKenzie, Bid Sea Sgs N Sc, 74 prints a song called The Sea Captain which is, as he states, rather closely related to The Broomfield Hill.
44. THE TWA MAGICIANS
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 442 reports that an Islesford, Maine woman recognized, but could not repeat, the Child Buchan Mss, text. See also the Barry Mss. in the Harvard University Library.
45. KING JOHN AND THE BISHOP
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 445 (trace) / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 58 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 200 / Gardner and Checkering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 379 / JAFL, XXI, 54, 57 / NTFLQ, I,#i, 45 / Parsons, F-L Cape Verde Is, 94 (prose) / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 8.
Local Titles: King John and the Abbot, King John and the Bishop, The Bishop of Canterbury.
Story Types: A: Mighty King John sends for the Archbishop of Canterbury and tells the churchman that he is a greater scholar than this king (or makes some such accusation) and that if he doesn't answer three questions correctly he will be beheaded. The questions are how much the King is worth mounted in all his state, how long the King will be travelling this world about, and what the King is thinking. The bishop goes homeward. On the way he meets a shepherd who offers to disguise himself as the churchman and answer the riddles. The shepherd tells King John that he is worth a piece less than Jesus, may go with the sun and circle the world in twenty-four hours, and thinks the man before him is the Archbishop of Canterbury. The King is amused by the wit of the man and excuses both.
Examples: Flanders, Ft F-S Bids; JAFL, XXI, 54.
Discussion: The American versions, all from the North, seem to be closely related to Child B. See Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 379 and Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 200. The story is varied in a number of minor details, such as the shepherd's reward and the reason for the riddles being asked. However, even the refrain "derry down, etc.", is retained in the Vermont
text. See Flanders, loc . cit.
The riddles of the story are not unusual. They appear in the same general form in European, American, Cape Verde, and Phillipine prose and poetic folklore. See MAFLS, XV, 94; XII, 287; JAFL, XXI, 58 (from N. J. via Missouri); and Child, I, 405 ff.
46. CAPTAIN WEDDERBURN'S COURTSHIP
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 93 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 6 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 139 / JAFL, XXIII, 377; XXIV, 335 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 14 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 108. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 35.
Local Titles: A Gentle Young Lady, Bold Robbington, Captain Woodstock, Mr. Woodbum's Courtship, Six Questions.
Story Types: A: A keeper of the game wishes to sleep with a certain girl. She coyly refuses until he has answered six (or some other number) questions. When he replies to those asked, he claims his right to sleep with her and not lie "next to the wall". She, however, asks three more questions. When he answers these, she asks no more and soon yields to his wishes.
Examples: Barry (A), Creighton, Gardner and Chickering (A).
"Discussion: The American texts of Captain Wedderburn's Courtship are rare and, to my knowledge, concentrated in the northeastern portions of the United States and Canada. Where the ballad is found it is close to the Child versions, although condensed. However, it is not improbable that these American songs have come over from Britain by way of Ireland,
Riddle ballads are extremely old (see Child, 1, 4156), and it is likely that the actual questions and answers that are used by the coy maid and her lover have become attached to this song from a tradition of their own. Throughout the United States it is common to find the riddles existing alone as a song known under the title I Gave My Love a Cherry. For representative examples consult Alberta P. Hannum, Thursday April, 204; Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 141 and Sgs Sng So Aplchns, 25; Kincaid, Fav Mt Bids, 15; Kolb, Treasry F-S, 301; Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 230; Scott, Sing of Am, 54; and SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, II, 190.
Child, I, 415 refers to a number of nursery songs which use these same riddles. See Halliwell's Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales, 150. Such texts are common to America under such titles as the Four Brothers or Peri Meri Dictum and make use of the motif that four brothers (three cousins) have sent a series of presents, the first a "cherry without a stone", etc. The gifts
are subsequently explained. Representative texts can be found in the following works: Brown Collection; Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 2$; Franklin Square Song Collection (N. Y., 1881), 66; JAFL, XXIX, 157; Linscott, F-S Old NE, 267; Mother Goose's Melodies (N. Y., 1877), 53, 82; Niles, More Sgs Hill Flk, 12; and Randolph, OzF-S, II, 432. The garbled Latin refrain "perry merry
dictum dominee" is characteristic of these songs.
Two points of note concerning the American versions of Child 46 are that the Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, text is uniquely told in the first person and that the "next to the wall" theme has caused a large amount of textual confusion.
For a discussion of the American ramifications of the Child ballad and the riddles see Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 140.
47. PROUD LADY MARGARET
Reed Smith, SC Bids, p. 171-4 lists this ballad among the American survivals of Child songs. I have been unable to find any printed record of its existence in oral tradition. However, as the song is not on Smith's subsequent list (SFLQ, I, $2, 911), I believe the first entry to be a mistake. See the local titles for Young Hunting (68).
49. THE TWA BROTHERS
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 99 / Belden, Mo F-S, 33 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 55 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, V, 6 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 17 / Child, 1, 443 / Cox, F-S South, 33 / Cox, Trd Bids WVa, Davis, Trd Bid Va, 146 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 26 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 97 / Hudson, F"S Miss, 73 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #7 / JAFL, XXVI, 361 ; XXVIII, 300; XXIX, 158; XXX, 294; XLVIII, 298; LII, 35 / JFSS, VI, 87 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 278 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 55 / Morris, Flo, F-S, 388 / North American Review, CCXXVIII, 223 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 45 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, 10 / Powell, 5 V& F-S, 15 / Randolph, Oz,
F-S, I, 76 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 1 66 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, # 1 1 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 69 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 7 / SFLQ, II, 65; VIII, 141 / Vt Historical Society, Proceedings, N.S., VIII, 1939, 102 / Va FLS Butt, :$:s 35, 7, 9, 10.
Local Titles: Billy Murdered John, John and William, Little Willie, Said Billie to Jimmie, Take My Fine Shirt, The Dying Soldier, The Rolling of the Stones, The Two Brothers, The Two School Boys, Two Born Brothers, Two Little Boys, Two Little Schoolmates.
Story Types: A: Two brothers wrestle (or fight in some way), and, because of jealousy over a mutual sweetheart (though this is often not clear), one pulls a knife and tills the other. Sometimes the older is the murderer; sometimes the younger. After the crime, there is a dying dialogue in which the killer asks his brother what he is to tell the family and the true-love. In some versions the dying lad's replies are actually repeated by the killer to the persons involved. Regardless, when the girl hears of the murder she charms the dead lover from his grave and requests a last kiss. The request is refused, and in a few texts the grief of the maid is revealed.
Examples: Davis (A); Belden; SFLQ, VIII, 141.
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, except the crime is accidental, rather than being the result of jealousy, passion, or the like.
Examples: Linscott; JAFL, XXVI, 361; XXIX, 158; SharpK (C).
C: The story is the same as that of Type A, except that all traces of the love affair and the jealousy have vanished.
Examples: Brewster (A, B); Davis (J); Randolph, Oz F-S (A, B, C).
D : From The Dying Soldier title and the absence of the murder, the story seems to have assumed a battlefield locale. It has become a plea for Willie to wrap "his" wound, carry him to the church, and bury him.
Examples: SFLQ, II, 66.
E : The murder happens as the result of spontaneous anger during a day-long test of strength between two brothers in the woods. The whole Type A story is included. Additional Edward, stanzas occur at the end and serve to add most the Type A of that ballad, as well as to implicate the mother in the crime. This last feature is in direct contradiction of The Twa Brothers
reason for the crime.
Examples: Vt. Historical Society, Proceedings.
Discussion: The American texts of this ballad may well be older than the Child B version which is the parallel of so many of them. Barry, Brit Bids Me, icoff. in relating his own texts with the SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, and Me Gill, F-S Ky Mts, southern versions expresses this view and points to the marked similarities in the widely separated texts, as well as to the fact that no songbook copies exist.
Child B has major points in common with most New World versions (See Type A). The stabbing is on purpose and not accidental, the fe-ending is not present, and the kissing of the ghost motif (from Sweet William's Ghost, 77) appears. Generally, American versions name the girl Susie and not Margaret as in Child, though the boy's names, John and William, are re- tained. Usually, the brothers of Child become small boys whose age is incompatible with the events of the story.
Barry (BFSSNE, V, 6ff.) suggests the rivalry was originally for the incestuous love of the sister. Belden, Mo. F-S, 33 and SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, K lend support to this idea. Incestuous love is not uncommon to the ballad, as is indicated by Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 94. See also Child 11 and 51.
Other American texts follow Child A (my Type B) and the Child D-G series (my Type E). Type B simply has the accidental death, which is a well-established mitigation of the tragedy. Type E adds the Edward-snAing. With this addition, the Flanders, Ft. Historical Society, text goes even farther than the Child D-G series in modelling a new story about 49 by means of 13. The
implication of the mother is utterly out of place here because we are told earlier that the murder is the result of anger and frustration caused by the even struggle. For further study of this unique (to America) combination, Child G (the children's game); Cox, F-S South, 33; and Powell, 5 7a F-S (for similar start) should be investigated. See, as well, Morris (SFLQ, VIII,
140) who points out the relationships of The Twa Brothers to Edward, Sir Orfeo, and Sir Hugh in its theme, harping, and nursery language.
Type C stories reflect the process of forgetting. Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 79 prints a comment in a headnote that is revealing. " 'It was originally a long piece', she (his informant) said, 'about a fool boy who murdered his brother with a pocket-knife, just because he did not feel like playing baseball!" Type D may well relate to this same group, although the battlefield locale
seems to indicate localization. The Kirklands (SFLQ, II, 65) state that the singer believed the ballad to be a Civil War song. See also the last stanza of the Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, 7 text.
Two other American deviations worth note are the Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 17 version which is unusual in that the older boy throws the younger on a pit of stones before killing him and is told to inform the parents as well as the true-love where the body is buried; and the Haun, Cocke 'Cnty, 97 text which has a number of lines directed at mean school-teachers and has the
dying boy ask to have his teacher told he is going where he can get some peace. This latter song was collected from a little girl at school, which may account for the change. The Cox, Trd Bids W Va, 15 version is remarkable in that it opens with "girls a-rolling stone" as well as the usual boys playing ball.
Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 76ff. discusses a selected group of texts quite thoroughly.
51. LJZIE WAN
Texts: BFSSNE, VII, 6 / Morris, F-S Fla, 390 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 89 / SFLQ, VIII, 142.
Local Titles; Fair Lucy.
Story Types: A: Lucy is with child by a lover (that her plight is the result of incest is not clear). Her brother, James, kills her and takes her head to her mother. There follows a question and answer (see Edward) motif of the "what will you do when your father comes home?" sort. The brother, of course, says he will leave and never return.
Examples: SharpK.
B: Lucy is pregnant and her own brother is the lover. Her mother, sister, and brother each hear her crying, ask the cause, and are told the reason. The brother takes her to a wood and kills her. There is the Edward-ending.
Examples: BFSSNE, VII, 7 (I); SFLQ, VIII, 142.
Discussion: The story is not clear in the Type A version. The plight of Lucy, the brother's entrance, and the dialogue with the mother are all that remain. In the Type B texts, where the story is clearer, the trip to the wood is found, a feature not in Child.
It is certain that an interchange between this song and Edward took place sometime early in British tradition.
The song is rare in America, although there is a re-working of the story in The Forget-me-not Songster (Nafis & Cornish, N. Y., c. 1845), p. 247 called The Bloody Brother.
53. YOUNG BEICHAN
Note: For further references to the large number of printed texts in the tradition of Young Beichan and its derivative The Turkish Lady consult JAFL, XXX, 2967.
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 106 / Berea Quarterly, XVIII, 12, / Brown Coll / Butt Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 68 / Bull V SC# 162, #3 / ChappeU, F-S Rnke Alb, 18 / Cox, F-S South, 36 / Cox, Trd Bid W Fa, 16 / Cox, W. Fa. School Journal and Educator, XLVI, 20 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 158 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 38 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 28 / Edward Eggleston, Transit of Civilization, 137 / Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 204 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 143 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 16 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newjdldy 17 / Harper's Mgz (May, 1915), 903 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 58 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 75 /
Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #8 / Hummel Oz F-S / JAFL, XVHI, 209; XX, 251 ; XXII, 64; XXVI, 3535 XXVIII, 1495 XXX, 294; XLI, 585; XLII, 259 / Kincaid, Fav Mt Bids, 26 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 16 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 115 / Minish Mss. / Morris, F-S Fla, 292 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 33 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, 9 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, 2 / Raine, Land Sddle Bags, 109 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 80 / Randolph, OzMtFlk, i^\ Elizabeth M. Roberts, The Great Meadow (N.Y., 1930), 645 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 210 / Scott, Sing of Am, 40 / Sewanee Review, XIX, 316 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, # 12 /
SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 81 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, jj SFLQ, VIII, 144 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 104 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 86 / Va FLS Bull, #3 2, 3, 59, 12 / Wheeler, STy Mt F-S, 89 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, 58.
Local Titles: A Gentlemen of the Court of England, Lord Ateman, Lord Bateman (Bakeman, Baitsman, Batesman, Behan, etc.), Lord Bateman and the Turkish Lady, Lord Bateman's Castle, Lord Wetram, The Jailer's Daughter, The Noble Lord, The Turkish Lady, Young Behan.
Story Types: A: Lord Bateman, an English nobleman, is captured by the Turks while on a sea voyage. Put in prison, he wins the heart of a Turkish maid who sees him there. She frees him, after a mutual pact that neither will marry for seven years is agreed upon. At the end of that time, having no word from her lover, she sets out to find him. In England, Lord Bateman
has just brought home a bride, but when he learns that his true-love has appeared on the scene he sends the bride home again (none the worse for him) and plans a marriage with the Turkish girl.
Examples: Barry (A); Davis (A); Randolph, OzF-S (A).
B : The story is basically the same as that of Type A. However, the girl's father builds her a ship to sail after her lover, Lord Bateman attempts to marry the Turkish girl to his elder and younger brothers when she appears in England, and she continually reminds the Lord of a 90,000 forfeit he must pay if he doesn't marry her.
Examples: Henry (A).
Discussion: Most American versions of this song compare closely with Child L as to length, detail, and story outline. Some of the minor points vary: for example, the mention of the hole bored in the hero's shoulder (see Child H, etc.), the lady's desire for the Lord's body rather than material reward, and a home such as India, etc. for the hero. The miraculous voyage
(Child C, etc.) has been excluded in America, as is generally the case with such matter, and no traces of the supernatural Billy Blin remain.
Kittredge (J4FL, XXX, 295) used "the hole bored in the hero's shoulder" as a means of distinguishing the texts akin to Child L from those of the Coverly broadside (Isaiah Thomas Collection, Worcester, Mass,) group. It is possible the Indian home of Beichan comes from this broadside, although Barry (Brit Bids Me, 109) is doubtful. It is also noteworthy that the great majority of the New World texts use a variation of the English Bateman name, rather than the Scottish Beichan.
The name of the hero is subject to a great number of spellings in America: Bacon, Ateman, and Beechman being particularly unusual. The girl, as in Child, always has a singularly un-Turkish name such as Suzanne, Sophia, Honey, Silky, Friar, Susie Free, Susie Pines, Susanna Spicer, etc.
SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns (F) prints an interesting American ending that relates how the Turkish girl "was put on the house enrolment, Lord Beechman's landlady", which seems unbelievable in view of the fact that one stanza before he has returned the bride to her mother. The Wyman and Brockway (Lnsme Tunes, 58 and JAFL XXII, 64) Kentucky texts do not include the return of the bride, but in them the Lord swears hell give up all his lands and dwellings for his Turkish love. See also Scott, Sing of Am, 40. The Henry {JAFL, XLII, 259) text finds Behan (note the Scottish name) living in Glasgow and the jilted bride a brown girl. In the Cox, Trd Bids W VCL, Lord Wetram version the length of time is four rather than seven years and the bride's father and not her mother takes the daughter home.
The story has been subject to confusion and corruption in America. Thomas (Devil's Ditties^ 86) prints a text that is obscured as to narrative through the misplacement of a stanza. In addition, there is a large group of derivative songs that go under the name of The Turkish Lady in this country. Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc 9 26 and MacKenzie, Bids Sea. Sgs N Sc, 66 and
Quest Bld y 130 publish examples, while Barry reprints a Forget-me-not Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N. Y., c. 1845) 169 text in JAFL, XXIII, 450. Other illustrative examples of the derivatives of this song can be seen in the Forget-me-not Songster (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia and N. Y.), 248; Marsh's Book of a Thousand Songs for the Million,- 171 ; The Old Forget-me-not Songster (Locke & Dubin, Boston), 171 ; and the Washington Songster (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia andN. Y.), 13 1. The JAFLTtet (XXX, 296 ff.) cited in the note includes the "Lord Bateman" broadsides in the Harvard University Library and some Turkish Lady references. The song also appears in children's book form. See Me Loughlin, N. Y., c. 1877.
Child (I, 455 ff.) discusses the affinities of this song and the Hind Horn romance and the Gilbert a Becket legend. For remarks on the seven-year pact and the traditional common law on presumption of death see Wheeler, Ky Mt F-S, 89, headnote. The version printed here is one of the more complete of the American texts. Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child
Ballads, 83 ff. treats the whole American tradition through an extensive study of selected texts.
54. THE CHERRY-TREE CAROL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 446 (trace) / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, VI, 14 / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 78 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 172 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs 7t, 48 / Henry, F-S So HgUds, 59 / Jackson, Down East Spirituals, 60 / JAFL, XXIX, 2935 XLV, 13 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 60 / Minish Mss. / Morris, F-S Flo, 39$ / NTFLO, I, 48 / Niles, 7 Ky Mt Tunes, 4 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 47 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 88 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 60 / SFLQ, VIII y 145 / Sharp C, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, 4J: 13 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 54 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 12 / Thomas, Bid Makin' Mts Ky, 223 ff. / Fa FLS Bull>
#s 4, 5 1 Wheeler, Ky Mt F-S, 3.
Local Titles; Cherry-Tree Carol, Joseph and Mary, Sweet Mary, Sweet Mary and Joseph, The Cherry Tree, The Sixth of January.
Story Types: A: Mary accompanies Joseph to Jerusalem. On the way she requests her husband to pull some cherries down from a tree, as she thinks she is pregnant and desires them. Angered, Joseph tells her to get the father of her child to pull them down. Christ then speaks from the womb (or the Lord speaks from Heaven) to the tree which bends to the ground miraculously. Generally, it is implied that Joseph is abashed.
Examples : Davis (A).
B : The Type A story is sometimes continued to the extent that Joseph takes Mary on his knees, begs forgiveness, and asks the child when his birthday will be. The child speaks from the womb and names Old Christmas Day as his birthday. Some texts have an additional description of the birth.
Examples: McGill; SharpK (A, B); Thomas, p. 229 C.
C: Mary asks for cherries and orders the tree to bow herself. There is no remark about the father. Heavenly voices, rather than the Christ-child, tell Joseph of his son's birth and of the manger.
Examples: Thomas, p. 226 B; Wheeler.
D: The usual story is presented but a number of stanzas are added telling where and how the Saviour was born and reviewing, when the Christ-child speaks, the main events of His life.
Examples: Flanders.
E: A lyric derived from the above story which reveals how, as Joseph and Mary walked in the cherry garden, they heard angel voices prophesying the birth of Jesus in a stall.
Examples: JJFL, XLV, 13; NTFLQ, I, 48.
Discussion: Child (II, i) discusses the origin of the story in the Pseudo-Matthew-Gospel. See also Migne, Patrologia Graeca, LXVII, 1281. Here the tree is a palm, and the baby does not speak from the womb. In England, the tree became a cherry, Jesus is in the womb, and Joseph suspects infidelity when he hears of his wife's pregnancy. There are also further stanzas added in which Joseph is told by an angel of the Nativity. The story has a widespread history, Child (II, i) noting its occurance in the Coventry Mystery Cycle and Davis (Trd Bid Fa, 172) finding it in the sermon of a Negro preacher. See also JAFL, XXX, 297.
The ballad was not found in America until 1915 (See JAFL, XXIX, 293 4). It is not extremely rare, however. The American texts located have five story types, all of which show affinities with the Child texts. Certain American variations usually can be found: Joseph generally takes Mary on his knees; Jesus more consistently speaks from the womb; Type A lacks the
"angel" stanzas; and Old Christmas Day is named as the child's birthday.
This last feature, which does not occur in the Child texts, is the subject of an interesting discussion in SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 415. Here it is pointed out that the B and C texts give January 5 as the date of Old Christmas as it was in 1752 after eleven days were dropped from the calendar (1751). In 1800 another day was taken away, and still another in 1900, so that January 7 is now Old Christmas Day. The McGill, F-S KyMts, 60 text prints January 6 as the date.
Child (II, i) points out that "in Catalan and Provencal the tree is an apple". Barry, Brit Bids Me 9 446 reports that a number of Maine people were familiar with this song and one individual with an Irish "apple-tree and Virgin (not Mary)" text. Also note the stones which cry from the streets and wall in praise of Mary in the Type A Minish Mss. version. See Child A, B for use of these stones in a different way.
The song is sometimes given humorous treatment in America. See Niles, 7 Ky Mt ^uneS) 5 (footnote) and the text itself.
56. DIVES AND LAZARUS
Texts: Davis, Trd Sid Fa, 175 / Jackson, Dozen East Spirituals, 27 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns, 253 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, II, 29 / SFLQ, II, 68 / Va FLS Bull,#iz.
Local Titles: Lazarus, Lazarus and Dives, The Rich Man and Lazarus, The Rich Man Dives.
Story Types: A: Lazarus begs the crumbs from rich Dives' table. The latter scorns him, although the dogs take pity on him and lick his sores. After death, when Dives has gone to Hell and Lazarus to Heaven, the situation is reversed, and Dives begs Abraham to send Lazarus to him with water. Abraham reminds the sinner of his actions while on earth and of the great
gulf between Heaven and Hell. In the complete Virginia text, Dives then repents and requests that Lazarus be sent to warn Dives' brethren who are headed for ruin too.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: The American texts of this ballad are quite corrupt and, to quote Davis, 3W Sid Va, 175, differ entirely "except in the bald outline of the Biblical story,, from the Child versions". Both this text and the SFLQ song are extremely compressed and the Kirklands call their version a derivative. In the Sha-rp collections Lazarus is not even included among the ballads.
Typical of the changes the story has undergone in its sea-voyage is the incident in wild the dogs figure. In Child Dives sends men with whips and the dogs out to nLangle Lazarus, but they find they have no power to hurt him. In America the dogs are restrained by pity alone. In addition the language of the Virginia version is not ballad language and there is almost no rime.
For a discussion of a possible Gaelic introduction of this song into America, see George P. Jaclson, Down East Spirituals, 27. His text is reprinted from Davis, loc. cit.
58. SIR PATRICK SPENS
Texts: Brown Coll | SFLQ, I, #i, 10; #4, i.
Local Titles: Sir Patrick Spens.
Story 'Types: A ; The king needs a skipper to sail his ship to Norway and "bring home 5 ' Qu&en Margaret's lass. On a counsellor's advice, he writes Sir Patrick Spens. Sp&ns rues the assignment because of the season, but sets out anyway. After a number of insults thrown at him and his crew in Norway, Spens from pride sets sail in the face of an impending storm. The gale strikes, and in spite of cloth wrapped about its sides the ship flounders. The ladies may sit and wait a but Sir Patrick Spens will never come home.
Examples : SFLQ, I, #i, 10; #4,1.
Discussion; FOE a discussion of the discovery of this ballad in America see SFLQ., I, #1,3. The text given in that issue is excellent, with the famous "old moon" and closing stanzas intact.
Child, II, 19 20 cites events that are possible historical bases for the story. The most likely are the voyages centering about the marriage of Margaret and Eric of Norway in 1281 and the subsequent return of their daughter to marry Edward I of England in 1290.
The American story follows the Child G-J series. The Tennessee ( $4, i) text is abbreviated, however, and leaves out the "moon" stanza, the "wrapping" of the ship during the storm, and the poetic end. The reasons for Spens' leaving Norway and for his being sent have been obscured, and the King is looking for a new sailor in the end. The mood is cold and objective.
62. FAIR ANNIE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 446 / Boston Sunday Globe, 4 iS'zo / Child Mss. / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 129 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 177 / SharpC, F-S So Aplcbns,#it / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchian I, 95.
Local Titles: Fair Annie, Lady Eleanor, The Sister's Husband.
Story Types: A: Lord Thomas tells his poor and stolen love, Fair Annie, by whom lie has had six sons and is expecting another, that he is bringing a rich bride home. She is crushed, but waits for his return and even serves at the wedding. Later she and the bride learn that they are sisters. (Traditionally this discovery originates in a song sung by the heroine. In America the
song is just unexplained fluting.) The bride offers her riches to this sister and sends her back to the home from which Thomas had stolen her. In some songs a condition that Thomas be hung is made.
Examples: Davis.
B : The added information is presented at the start of the story that Annie was stolen by Indians and ransomed from them by the Lord.
Examples: Combs.
Discussion: A summary of the Child stories (See Davis, Trd Bid Va, 177 is as follows : Annie was stolen in her childhood by a knight from over the sea, to whom she has born seven sons out of wedlock. Her consort bids her prepare to welcome a bride, with whom he shall get gowd and gear; with her he got none. She must look like a maid, comb down her yellow locks, and
braid her hair. Annie meekly assents, as she loves the knight. Suppressing her tears, Annie serves at the wedding and makes the bride comfortable. When the married couple go to bed, Annie in a room by herself bewails her lot in a sad song to her harp or her virginals. The bride hears the song and goes to Annie's chamber to see what is wrong. There, she inquires of Annie's parentage and learns they are sisters. The bride, who had come with many well-loaded ships, gives most of her wealth to Annie and goes home a virgin.
The American versions are invariably compressed and take a lot for granted even if the story is already known a fact that reveals clearly how material becomes unexplainable in transmission. The Type A story follows Child A most closely and retains the names Annie and Thomas (probably borrowed in Britain from 73). The Child Mss. version printed by Barry in Brit Bids Me, 446 (See JAFL, XXVII, 57) is from Massachusetts and differs textually from the southern American versions. The SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplclns, North Carolina text has lost the fluting and is very hard to follow. Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 129 attributes the presence of Indians in his version to the currency of the ballad on the frontier. See Type B.
63. CHILD WATERS
Texts: Brown Coll / Randolph, Oz F-S^ I, 89.
Local Titles: Fair Ellen, The Little Page Boy.
Story 7ypes: A: (As given to Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 89 from Fayetteville, Ark.) A young man deserts a poor girl to court a rich. lady. The girl disguises herself as a page and accompanies him to the castle. She cares for his horse and even rides behind him unrecognized. Eventually her sex becomes known through pregnancy. She gives birth to a son in a stable, and the lover, hearing this, comes to her and decides to marry her.
Examples: Randolph.
Discussion: The American version gives a more practical reason for the lover's cruelty than those implied in Child, and the disguised identity of the girl makes the story slightly different. This latter change may well be due to American chivalry.
65. LADY MAISRY
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 448 (trace) / Davis, Trd Bid Va^ 180 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 137 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns^ I, 97 / Va FLS Still, # 1 1.
Local Titles: Lady Maisry.
Story Types: A: A girl is with child, and her parents are planning to burn her at the stake. She sends her oldest brother's son to tell her lover what has happened and to get him to attend the burial. The boy goes and informs the lover who hurries to the girl's house blowing his bugle. The girl, hearing, is tied to the stake unafraid. The hero rushes up just in time to tear her
dying form from the flames and kiss her. He then wills his land to the oldest brother's son. Examples: SharpK (A).
B: The same story is told. However, it is abbreviated and has a cliche ending added so that the man is late and can only stop the funeral, kiss the corpse, and die himself.
Examples: Scarborough.
Discussion: The American versions remain pretty close to the Child story, although the complete tale does not exist over here. Child (II, iiz)'s summary of the story, as quoted by Davis, Trd Bid Va> 1 80, gives the action as follows: It is discovered that Maisry goes with child. Her brother or father demands that she renounce the lord who is the English lover, but she refuses.
Her father offers her the choice of marrying an old man or burning at the stake. In some versions the family (in keeping with romance practice) begins preparations to burn her without mention of choice. Maisry is warned of her fate and sends a devoted young messenger to carry word to her lord. The English lord, on learning what has happened, saddles his best steeds and hurries off. Maisry, in the flames, hears the bugle. She scorns her family's efforts. In some texts she cries out to her lover that she would cast his son from the fire if her hands were free. He leaps into the blaze for a last kiss as her body crumbles. On seeing her dead, the Englishman threatens cruel retaliation on the family, deeds to be followed by his suicide.
The Type A text seems to substitute the will-writing for the revenge threats, though one can not be sure. Certainly the ending of this incomplete version is less severe. The Type B story is not in Child and is quite conventional (See Lord Lovel and Barbara Allen).
66. LORD INGRAM AND CHIEL WYET
Reed Smith lists this ballad among the Child survivals in America. See SFLQy I, $2, 9 ii. I have not, however, been able to locate a published text of it.
67. GLASGERION
On Page 11 of BFSSNE, III there is a text printed by Phillips Barry of Jack the Jolly Tar which he terms a secondary form of Child 67. This song is a comic work concerning a sailor who gets a place to sleep for the night by anticipating the lover of a girl. However, such stories are extremely old and common. See Child, II, 137 for references.
68. YOUNG HUNTING
Texts: American Speech, III, njj Barry, Brit Bids Me, I22/ Belden,Mo.F-S, 34/Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 166 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 72 / Bull U SC# 162, #4 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 28 / Chappeil, F-S Enke Alb, 21 / Cox, F-S South, 42 / Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 283 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 182 / Delaney's Scotch Song Book (N.Y., 1910), 6 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 44 / Focus, V, 280 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 22 / Gordon, F-S Am, 66 / Harpers Mgz (May 1915), 909 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 145 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 77 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #9 / Hummel, OK F-S / JAFL, XX, 252; XXX, 2975 XLIV,
67; HI, 30 / Ky Cnties Mss. / Lunsford and Stringfield, 30 & i F-S So Mts, 22 / McDonald, Selctd F-S Mo, 20 / Morris, F-S Fla, 397 / N.T. Times Mgz, 10 9 '27 / Owens, SW Sings / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 24 / PTFLS, X, 143 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 90 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 203 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 64 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 134; SharpC, EngF-S So dplchns, # 15 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 101 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 107 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old WrU Bids, i$\Va FLS Bull, #s 5 7, 10 / William and Mary Literary Mgz, XXIX, 664.
Local Tides: Little Scotchee, Lord Banyan, Lord Barnet, Lord Barnet and Fair Eleonder, Lord Bonnie, Lord Henry, Love Henry (Henery), Pretty Polly, Proud Lady Margaret, Sir (Lord) Henry and Lady Margaret, Sweet William and Fair EUender, The Faulse Lady, The Old Scotch Well, The Scotland Man.
Story Types:
A: Lord Henry returns from a hunt and is invited to spend the night with his mistress Margaret. He refuses, saying a lady he loves far better (in. SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, N it is his wife) is waiting for him. About to depart, he leans over his horse's neck, her pillow, or the fence to kiss Margaret good-bye, and she stabs him. Henry then reveals he loves Lady Margaret and dies. She, with or without the aid of maids, sisters, etc., throws his body in a well. A bird accuses her of the crime; she attempts to bribe him and then threatens him, all to no avail. In most versions, the bird reveals her guilt.
Examples: Belden, Davis (A), SharpK (A).
B: The story is like that of Type A, but the motive for the killing has been obliterated. Henry refuses to stay for the night as he wishes to see his parents. Examples: Barry (B), Randolph, OzF-S (A).
C: A Ky. Miss. version begins with the girl's walking in the garden where she meets her father-in-law. He asks for his son, and she says her husband is out hunting, but is expected soon. The bird then speaks up and reveals that the lover is dead and his body in the well. The girl tries to bribe the bird, but the bird refuses to cease his accusations. Men dig in the well and find the
body, and the girl, as well as her maid, is hung.
Examples: Hudson (A).
D: The usual story is told. However, the girl commits suicide that night. She leaves her ring on Henry's finger in some versions. Examples: Cambiaire, Scarborough.
E: A corrupted version (The Forsaken Girl series) exists. In it Henry gives the girl's faithlessness as an excuse for his leaving her. She then upbraids him for forsaking her, wishes she were dead, and rues her lot of bearing him or child. Examples: Henry.
F: A confused and corrupt version exists in which the murder occurs outside a barroom. The body is thrown in a well, and the girl announces to all what she has done. The bird sequence has lost its purpose.
Examples: SharpK (H).
G: A lyric has developed from the final stanzas of dialogue between the bird and the girl in which the murder is only mentioned. Examples: SFLQ, VIII, 146.
Discussion: The original story of this ballad (Child A, C, H, K) frequently mentions the king's duckers, who find the body after a hint from the bird. The lady then swears she is innocent and tries to blame her maid. However, a trial by fire leaves the maid unscathed, but consumes the guilty one. Such material, except for traces in Type C, is not in America.
In general, the ballad is far more common in the South than in the North. In fact, the song is extremely rare in British North America, though Barry (JAFL, XVIII, 295) gives a melody without text. Belden, Mo F-S, 35 suspects the presence of a stall copy to have perpetuated the song over here. The similarity of the American versions backs up his opinion. As usual, these versions are compressed, and they lack the dressing up of the dead man and the mounting of him on his horse (Child A-D, G, H, J-K), the recovery of the drowned body (Child A-D, G, H, J-K), and the intoxication of the hero before the murder (Child A, J, K). It may be possible, nevertheless (see Belden, loc. cit.) that remnants of the drinking may be in Davis, Trd Bid Va, C, D; SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, D; JAFL, XXX, 301; Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids; and Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind.
The American Type A stories lack the fire ending and the duckers. Type B reveals how a ballad story can change. With some singer's (or publisher's) caprice the motive for the crime has been obliterated (see Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, $3, 72), although Barry, Brit Bids Me, 126 shows, through a later stanza in his B version, that this group is actually the same as Type A. Type C seems to be an adaption of the Child A, C, H, K series, although the lover is more properly married and the father of the youth is present. The revelation of the crime by a bird is in Child J-K.
The song has been subjected to much corruption. (See Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads, 93 ff.) The parrot stanzas of Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight (Child 4) have attached themselves to it both here and in Great Britain (Child I and Davis, op. cit^ A), while it has also mingled with its own derivative, The False Toung Man (SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns,
333, note, and # 94) ; Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 146; JAFL, XLIV, 67; and my Type E.) Types D and F are almost self-explanatory. The former is either a rationalization of the antiquated "fire" judgment or a localization, while the latter is one of those hybrids that is certain to occur if any song wanders long enough.
The confusion of the Scarborough, Sgrtchr So Mts, B text should be noted. The parrot and the girl, who are so often both named Polly, become completely confused, and the story vanishes in nonsense. In addition, Brewster, op. cit., 166 prints a version of The Trooper and the Maid, (299) that is about half Young Hunting. See Type C under 299.
See Zielonko, op. cit., 93 ff. for study of selected New World texts.
73. LORD THOMAS AND FAIR ANNET
Texts: Berea Quarterly, IX, #3, 10; XIV, #3, 27; XVIII, #4, 14 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 126 / Belden, Mo F-S, 37 / Boletin Latino Americano de Musica, V, 279 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 58 / Brown Coll / Bull U SC # 162, # 5 / CFLQ, V, 21 1 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 34, 1 1 5 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 23 / Child, III, 509 / Child MSB., XIII, #73 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 186 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 8 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 65 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 191 / Decennial Publication, Univ of Chicago, VII, 140 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 48 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 29 / Flanders, Gad Gn Mt Sg,6i/ Flanders, VtF-S Bids, 209 / Focus, III, 204; IV, 162 1 Folk Lore Journal, VII, 33 / The Forget-me-not Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N.Y.), 236 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hgblds, 49 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 37 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 7 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 18 / Haufrecht (ed.), Wayfariri Stranger, io/ Haun, Cocke Cnty, 74 / Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 16 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 60 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplcbns, 41 / HFLQ, III, = i, 10 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 78 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 13, 21 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, # 10 / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XVIII, 128; XIX, 235; XX, 254; XXVIII, 152; XXIX, 159; XXXIX, 94; XLII, 262; XLVIII, 314; LII, 75 / Ky Cnties Mss. / Kincaid, Fav Mt Bids, 36 / Leach-Beck Mss. / Luther, Amcns Their Sgs, 23 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea, Sgs N Sc, 20 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 97 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 14 / C.H. Matschat, Suwannee River, 63 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 28 / Minish Mss. / Morris, F-SFla, 398 / Neely and Spargo, Tales Sgs So III, 136 / Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, 20 / Niles, 7 Ky Mt Tunes, 12 / Nortb American Review, CCXXVIII, 221 / Outlook, LXIII, 120 / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 20 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 177 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 27 I Pound, Nebr Syllabus, n / PTFLS, X, 144 / Raine, Land Sddle Bags, 112 / Randolph, Oz F~S, I, 93 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 157 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 105 /
Sharp C, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, 4i6 / Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 115 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Sheppard, Cabins in the Laurel, 285 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 160 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 155 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 109 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anih Old Wrld Bids, 17 / SFLQ, II, 695 VIII, 147 / Stout, F-L la, 5 / The Survey, XXXIII, 374 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 88 / Va FLS Bull, :js 2, 3, 5 io / Wyman and Brockway, 20 Ky Mt Sgs, 14 / Wyman Mss. #9.
Local Titles: Fair Eleanor (Ellender, etc., eta), Fair Ellen, Fair Eleanor and the Brown Girl, Fy Ellinore, Lord Thomas, Lord Thomas and Fair Annet, Lord Thomas and Fair Eleanor, Lord Thomas and Fair Ellen, Lord Thomas and the Brown Girl, Lord Thomas's
Wedding, The Legend of Fair Eleanor and the Brown Girl, The Brown Bride, The Brown Girl, The Three Lovers, The Three True Lovers.
Story Types: A: Lord Thomas, in love with, poor but fair Eleanor, is persuaded to marry the rich brown girl. Dressed in scarlet and green, Eleanor, who has been personally informed of her misfortune by Lord Thomas, attends the wedding. She outshines the bride, and the latter stabs her to death in a fit of jealous rage. Lord Thomas then lolls the bride, usually by chopping off her head, and commits suicide.
Examples: Davis (A), SharpK (L), Smith (B).
B: The story is identical to that of Type A, except the youth is advised to marry the brown girl because she is poor and Fair Eleanor rich. In an Iowa text Lord Thomas' name has become attached to Eleanor's father.
Examples: JJFL, LII, 75; Scarborough (E).
Discussion: Child 73, 74, and 75 are very closely related, and they are frequently found blended. See, for example, Stanza I in the otherwise pure version of 73 in Henry, Beech MtF-S, 16. Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 191 cites the distinguishing marks. (See also Child, II, 180.) In 73 there is a triangle with three violent deaths; in 74, a triangle and two remorseful deaths; in 75 there
is no triangle and two remorseful deaths. All three make use of the rose-briar motif, although 73 uses this theme far less than the other two.
The majority of the American versions of this ballad are related to Child D, an English text. The Scottish form, with the contamination from 74 and the remarks by the brown girl on how Annet got her fair complexion, are not common in any of the more modern versions. Belden, Mo F-S, 37 feels that those ballads in which Lord Thomas is a bold forester show a close relationship to print. Check the bibliography with respect to Barry, Davis, SharpK, Shoemaker and The Forget-me-not Songster. This "bold forester" beginning is the most common form in America and has generally replaced the scene
of the lovers on the hill which is common to both 73 and 74 in Child.
In America, Lord Thomas invariably goes to tell Eleanor of his decision himself and does not send a messenger as in Child C, E, F, H, and I. The lovers always consult their parents, never their sisters, as in Child A, B, F, G, and H. Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 37 contains the added injury of Thomas' seating Annet at his right, while Hudson, F-S Miss, E
has a unique repetition of lines. The names of the heroine may vary all the way from Eleanor to Fairrellater and Fair Ellington, and the hero is called Jimmie Randolph in Virginia. Note that Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 67 mentions "Dunny's Well" running black. See Child E.
For a very detailed discussion of the verbal variations in this song see SFLQ, I, #4, 25 ff. Reed Smith, SC Bids, no treats the history of the song, and Belden, MLN 9 XXII, 263, reviews the methods by which the counsel is asked. For a comparison of Percy's text and a South Atlantic States "poor buckra" version see C. E. Means in Outlook, September 1899, 12off. Tolman,
JAFL, XXIX, 154 publishes a parody (many of which exist), and Mabel Minor, PTFLS, X, 144 notes that the song is used as a play-party game in Texas.
74. FAIR MARGARET AND SWEET WILLIAM
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 1 34 / Belden, Mo F-S, 48 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 71 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 66 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 25 / Child, V, 293 / Cox, F-S South, 65 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 378 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 64 / Davis, Trd Sid Va, 221 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 34 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 213 / Focus, IV, 426 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 40 / Harper's Mgz (June, 1903), 272 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 94 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 87 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-S, :j 1 1 / Hummel, Oz F-S I JAFL, XIX, 281; XXIII, 381 5 XXVIII, 154; XXX, 3035 XXXI, 74; XXXV, 340;
XLVIII, 301 / Leach-Beck Mss. / Lunsford and Stringfield, 30 & j F-S So Mis, 2 / Luther, Amcns Their Sgs, 20 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 25 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 124 / Me Gill, F-S Ky Mts, 71 / Minish Mss. / Neely and Spargo, Tales Sgs So III, 141 / North American Review, CCXXVIII, 221 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 40 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 108 / Randolph, The Ozarks, 181 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 103 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #*7 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 139 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / SFLQ, II, 69 / Va FLS Bull, =[s 26, 8 10 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, 94.
Local Titles: Fair Margaret and Sweet William, False William, Lady Margaret (Marget, Maggie, Margot, etc., etc.), Lady Margaret's Ghost, Lady Maud's Ghost, Little Marget, Lyddy Margot, Lydia Marget, Pretty Polly and Sweet William, Sweet William, Sweet William's Bride, Sweet William and Lady Margaret, Sweet Willie, William and Margaret.
Story Types: A: Sweet William, rising and dressing in blue, denies that he and Lady Margaret are in love and states that she will see his bride the next day. Margaret, after watching the wedding procession past her window, throws down her comb, leaves the room, and is never more seen alive. That night William sees Margaret's ghost at the foot of his bed in a dreamlike
vision. (In some texts he also dreams of swine and blood.) The ghost asks how he likes his bride, and he replies that he loves the person at the foot of his bed far better. When William awakes, he tells his wife of the vision and goes to see Margaret. Her family shows him her body, and he kisses the corpse before dying himself.
Examples: Belden (A), Davis (A), Gardner and Chickering.
B : The story is the same as that of Type A, except that Margaret commits suicide by throwing herself from the window (or by some such means). The death is on-stage, instead of off-stage.
Examples: Barry (A); Belden (B); Randolph, OzF-S (A).
C: The story is the same as that of Type A, except that it is William's bride who has the dream. She tells it to William.
Examples : Barry (B), Haun.
D: The usual story is told, but the off-stage actions of Margaret after she leaves the window are described. She has her mother and sister make her "bed and bind her head because she feels ill. She then dies of a broken heart.
Examples : MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc.
E: The usual story is told, except that Margaret is still alive when she comes to the foot of William's bed.
Examples: JAFL, XXIII, 381.
F: An incomplete text in which the ghost comes to the foot of the bed and blesses the sleeping lovers before going to the grave has been found.
Examples: Minish Mss. (Sweet Willie, ).
Discussion: This song is very popular in America, but the New World texts are not very like any Child version. Generally (see Davis, Trd Bid Va, 221), they follow Child A in the "such dreams" stanza; Child B in the conversation of William and Margaret's ghost (but see Barry, Brit Bids Me, B and Haun, Cocke Cnty) ; and Child C in the fact the bride is not brown (a corruption from 73 when it does occur). The puzzling opening scene of Child A (the talking on the hill) is generally dropped in America (but see Haun, Cocke Cnty, 94), and usually a scene of William rising and dressing in blue replaces it. The phrase "with the leave of my (wedded) lady" of the Child texts is frequently expanded (see Cox, F-S South, G and Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplchns, A) to a formal asking of the wife's permission to visit the dead Margaret.
Type B texts show the frequent trend toward the spectacular in the American ballad, and Type D is even more specific in the details of the death, at the same time revealing a change in narrative through the influence of convention. Type E is an excellent example of the American tendency to rationalize supernatural material, while Type F is an odd sentimentalization.
The SharpK, op. cit., versions are exceptionally interesting. A, a Type A story, has a confused beginning and a ghost which appears to both William and the bride. In B, also Type A, the wife goes with William to see Margaret the next morning. In addition, the Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, version opens with two stanzas that begin, "If you're no woman for me, and I'm no man for
you". And the whole Eddy text (J4FL, XXXV, 340) is worth note.
This song has affinities with 73, other than those mentioned above. See Child, II, 200. In the Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 76, C text Margaret attends the wedding against the advice of her mother, as does Annet or Eleanor in 73. The rest of the narrative of this version is the usual Type A sort.
Some incomplete texts exist which, tell the story with no mention of the ghost. These skip the events between Margaret's suicide and William's awakening the day after his wedding. See the Leach-Beck Mss.
75. LORD LOVEL
Texts: Allan's Lone Star Ballads (Galveston, 1874), 31 / Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 27 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 139 / Beadle's Dime Songs of the Olden Tradition (N.Y., 1863), 13 / Belden, Mo F-S, 52 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 79 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, I, 4 / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 61 / Bull U SC, #162, #6 / CFLQ, V, 210 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 27 / Child, V, 294 / Child Mss. / "Celebrated Lord Lovel and Lady Nancy Bell", Comic Ballad argd by y.C.y.j (Oliver Ditson, Boston, 1857) / Cox, F-S South, 78 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 24 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 358 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 69 / Davis, Trd
Bid Va, 240 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 39 / Everybody's Songster, (Sanford and Lott, Cleveland, 1839) / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 215 / Focus, IV, 215 / Gardner, F-L Schoharie Hills, 203 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mick, 43 / Guiding Song Songster (N.Y., 1865), 84 / Hadaway*s Select Songster (Portsmouth, N.H., 1832), 86 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 91 / Hudson,
F-S Miss, 90 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 16 / Hummel, Oz F-S / Clifton Johnson, What They Say in New England (Boston, 1897), 225 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, XVIII, 291 ; XIX, 283; XXIII, 381 ; XXVI, 352; XXXV, 343 ; XLVIII, 303 / JFSS, VI, 31 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 233 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 16 / McDonald, Selctd F-S Mo, 23 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 10 / Minish Mss. / Frank Moore's Personal and Political Ballads (N.Y., 1864), 321 / Frank Moore's Songs of the Soldiers (N.Y., 1864), 174 / Morris, F~S Fla, 417 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, 4 / New Pocket Song Book (N.Y., c. 1860), 20 / New York broadsides: c. 1855, J. Andrews; c. 1860,
H. deMarsan / North American Review, CCXXVIII, 220 / Tony Pastor's New Union Song Book (cop. 1862), 66 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 4 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, 9 / Randolph, OzF-S I, 1 12 / Randolph, OzMtFlk, 193 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 70 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 55 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 99 / Sharp C, EngF~S So Aplchns, # 18 / SharpK, EngF-S
So Aplchns, I, 146 / Shay, Drawn from the Wood, 134 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 146 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 140 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Singer's Own Song Book (Woodstock, Vt., 1838), 9 / Bob Smith's Clown Song Book, 51 / SFLQ, II, 70; VIII, 150 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 121 / Smith and Rufty, Am Antb Old Wrld Bids, 20 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Bnchs, 379 / Thomas, Sngin Gathrn, 38 / Va FLS Builds 210 / Carolyn Wells, A Parody Anthology, 326 / R.G. White's Poetry, Lyrical, Narrative and Satires of the Civil War (N.Y., 1866), 115.
Local Titles; Lady Nancy, Lady Nancy Bell, Lord Lovel (Lovell, Lowell, Lovinder, Leven, Lover, etc.), Lord Lovel and (Lady) Nancy Bell (Nancibell), Lord Lovel and Lady Nancy, Nancy Bell and Lord Lover.
Story Types; A: Lord Lovel tends his horse while Lady Nancy wishes him "good speed". He tells her he is going to see strange countries and says how long he will be gone. Sometimes, he says he is going for "too long" and that she will be dead when he gets back. Lovel leaves. He misses Nancy and comes home early. However, on arriving, he hears funeral bells and discovers his love has died. Dying of grief, he kisses the corpse. Usually, the rose-briar motif follows.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden (C), Davis (A).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, except that Lord Lovel returns after only two or three miles of travel when the ring on his finger "busts off" and his nose begins to bleed. Nancy's church-knell is underway before he is halfway back! Examples: Cox, F-S South (B).
Discussion: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 146 prints a brief history of this ballad. It is very common in America, and practically all the versions that are over here follow Child H, a London broadside. Most of them agree with each other. This similarity of texts and the song's popularity is undoubtedly due to its frequent inclusion in pre-Civil War songbooks and broadsides. See the
bibliography, Belden, Mo F-S, 52 states that the church name (St. Pancras) can be used to judge how close to print a version from oral tradition is. The name has taken a great number of forms, many of which are listed in the introductory, descriptive essay in this study.
Reed Smith has remarked that "the difference between reading it (Lord Lovel) as a poem and singing it is the difference between tragedy and comedy". (See SC Bids, 121). Davis, Trd Sid Va, 2401 also points out that the melodies are too light for the story matter and mitigate the tragedy. For this reason, the song has often been subject to parody. Typical burlesques
appear in Barry, op. cit., 145; Belden, Mo F-S, 54; Cox, F-S South, 78; Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 28; and Davis, op. cit., 258 (on Abe Lincoln).
The conventional ending in Haun, Cocke Cnty, 91 finds one lover buried under an oak and the other under a pine. Their hands touch with the leaves. The Type A, Cox, F-S South, C text implies that Lovel has been false to Nancy and thus gives a more substantial reason for her death. The Type B text reflects the effect a cliche can have on the story of a ballad. The result
is, of course, preposterous with respect to time. For a song with some similarities see BFSSNE, I, 4.
76. THE LASS OF ROCH ROYAL
Texts: Lass of Rocb Royal Story: Brown Coll / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 134 / Cox, F-S South, 83 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 347 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 107.
Examples of "Shoe My Foot" Stanzas: Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 29 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 149 / Belden, Mo F-S, 4808. / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 92 / Bull ?enn FLS, II, #i, 23 / Cambiaire, Ea <Ienn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 72 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 128 / Child, III, 511 / Cox, F-S South, 87 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 260 / Focus, III, 275 ; IV, 49 / Folk Lore Journal, VII, 31 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hghlds, 131 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 33 / Henry, F-S So HgUds, 69 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplchns, 24, 175 6 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 91 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 21 / Hummel, OzF-S / Guy B. Johnson, John. Henry, 98 ff. / JAFL, IV, 156; XXII, 240; XXVI, 181; XXVIII, 147; XLVT, 49 / Kolb, Treasury F-S, 40 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 17 / Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, 6 / N.C. Booklet, XI, 29 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 1 1 5 / Richardson, Am Mt %5 37 1 Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 37, 98, 1267; Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 123 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplc&ns, #s 56A, 61 A, 87, 9-{.C/ SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, II, #s 87, 94.0,
109 A, 1 14 A/ Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Spaeth, Weep Some More My Lady, 1 34 5 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 1 52 3 IV a FLS Bull, #s 2 10.
Local Titles: Fair Annie and Gregory, Lass of Roch Royal, Love Gregor, My Lady's Slipper, Sweet Annie of Roch Royal, Who Will Shoe My Pretty Little Feet ? (See also the list at the end of the Discussion.)
Story Types A: A girl with a new-born child goes to find her true love in a boat given her for the purpose by her father. A month later, when she reaches her lover's land and door, his mother answers her knock. The old woman accuses the girl of being a witch, etc., and, although the baby is freezing to death, will not believe that this is her son's sweetheart. She de-
mands the love tokens, but, upon seeing them, says Gregory has another love now and slams the door. (At this point there is a mix-up of person, for the sleeping lover seems to be talking to the girl.) When Gregory awakes from his sleep, he tells his mother he has dreamed that his sweetheart was at the door. The mother relates what really happened. The lover curses her
and races to the shore just in time to see his love's ship split in two drowning both her and their child. He then pulls the girl's body ashore and, after much mourning, dies of a broken heart. The "shoe my foot" sequence is at the start.
Examples: Combs, Cox (A).
B: The "shoe my foot" stanzas or stanza is often used as a song by itself, frequently with foreign material attached.
Examples: Davis (A); Henry, F-S So Hghlds (A); Sandburg (B).
C: These "shoe my foot" stanzas, divorced from the story, are put in the mouth of a man in Maine.
Examples: Barry (A).
D: This type is a combination of "careless love" lines, the ship and voyage vestiges of the story, the "shoe my foot" stanzas, and the refrain from Child 10. A girl's lover leaves her. She has her father build her a ship, follows him, and reaches the door of his home. His mother casts her out. It seems, she then finds her love dead in the sea.
Examples: Haun.
Discussion: There are few versions of this ballad in America, if the extremely popular "shoe my foot" stanzas are discounted. The Type A texts follow Child D in story and detail, while Type D is a corruption of what was probably the same material. Other lines have become attached to the tale, and the ending has been turned about in transmission. The text is a fine example of amalgamation and degeneration.
"Shoe my foot" stanzas are common all over the country. Whether they can be fairly considered native to Child 76 is questionable. They stand alone as songs (Davis, Trd Bid Fa, A-U; Sandburg, Am Sgbag, B); stand in conjunction with foreign matter (Davis, op. cit., Appendix A-I, Cox, F-S South, 413 ; Cambiaire, Ea lenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 72; SharpC, EngF-S So Applchs, 270); and infiltrate into all sorts of places. Belden, Mo F-S, 55, 48off.; Davis, op. cit., 260; and Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 6jH. discuss these lines in America. For Americanization of the material, Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mis, 124 (Honey Babe) and Odum and Johnson, Negro Workaday Songs (Who's Going to Buy Tour Whiskey 1) should be consulted, along with The Blue-eyed Boy printed in Belden, of. cit., 478. Of all the varied combinations of these stanzas with other material, perhaps the Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 128 text is the most interesting. Here "shoe my foot" lines, the "dove" stanzas from Lady Alice (85), and the "my love is like a rose" stanzas that Burns adopted (See MLR, VI, 514) are combined into one song. Also check
Davis, op. cit., Appendix D, p. 272.
A list of songs frequently corrupted by "shoe my foot" is: Kitty Kline, The False True Lover, John Henry, John Hardy, Wild Bill Jones, The Gamblin' Man, Lord Randal, James Harris, I Truly Understand, Careless Love, The Foolish Girl, My Dearest Dear, The Storms Are on the Ocean, The True Lover's Farewell, The Rejected Lover, Cold Winter's Night, The False Young Man, The Irish Girl, Turtle Dove, Mother's Girl, He's Gone Away, Bright Day, Hush o Hush You'll Break My Heart, Carolina Mountains, a
Negro Dancing Song. There are others.
77. SWEET WILLIAM'S GHOST
Texts: Brown Coll / Davis, FS Va / Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 240; Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 21 / Green Mountain Songster, 34 / North American Review, CCXXVTII, 222 / Minish Mss.
Local Titles: Lady Margaret, Lady Margaret and Sweet William.
Story Types: A: Lady Margaret in her bower hears a sound and learns it is her true love William. She asks what token he has brought her, and he replies only his winding-sheet. He then leads her to his grave and shows her where he lies. She wishes to lie with him, but his parents are at his head and feet and three hell-hounds at his side. The hounds stand for drunkeness, pride, and the deluding of a maid. He embraces her, bids her goodnight, and wishes her good rest. The return of the troth is not mentioned.
Examples : Greenleaf and Mansfield.
B : The story is the same as that of Type A, except the girl does not seem to wish to lie with her ghost-lover and the parents and hounds are replaced by three deceived sweethearts, three bastards, and three maids to guide his soul. He is seeking the return of his unfulfilled troth, and she refuses to give it back until he takes her to Scotland and kisses or weds her. When he
reveals he is a ghost, she accepts the separation and gives him her troth.
Examples: Flanders.
C: The usual story is told as far as the request for the kiss, but the lover frankly states that he is a ghost and is given his troth back so he can "go above". When the girl asks if she can lie with him, he says there is no room at his head or feet, but she can lie in his arms. The rooster then crows, and she knows that her hour to die has come.
Examples: Minish Mss. (Sweet Willie).
Discussion: The Type A and B American versions follow Child C in general story outline, though Type A seems to have lost the reason for the ghost's return. Type C is a new interpretation of the story, though similarities to Child D (in the place for Margaret to lie) can be noted. The quick return of the troth and the use of the rooster at the end of the tale (Child G) are not-
able. For a discussion of variations that occur in other Child texts and of the folk-lore behind the story, see Child, II, 2269.
The North American Review, CCXXVIII, 222 fragments are cited as lines from Clerk Saunders (69). This may be explainable in that some British texts of the latter have Sweet William's Ghost as an ending. See Child, II, 156.
78. THE UNQUIET GRAVE
Texts: Brown Coll / Davis, FS Va / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfoundl, 23 / JAFL, LII, 53 / Niles, More Songs Hill-Flk, #9.
Local Titles: The Auld Song from the Cow Head, The Unquiet Grave.
Story Types: A: A girl loses her lover who is slain. She mourns on his grave. After a year and a day the lad's ghost rises and asks her why she refuses to let him be. She requests one kiss. However, he reminds her that a kiss would be fatal and tells her not to mourn for him, that he must leave her and all the world for the grave.
Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield; JAFL, LII, 53.
Discussion: The song is very rare in America. The stories in the New World follow Child B and C in the sex of the mourner, but the American ending is not in those British texts, although similar lines complete Child A and D.
79. THE WIFE OF USHER'S WELL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 449 (trace) / Belden, Mo J?-S, 55 / Brown Coll / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 121 / Child, V, 294 / Cox, F-S South, 88 / Cox, W. Va, School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 388; XLV, 1 1 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 279 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 58 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 46 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hghlds, 59 / Grapurchat, East Radford (Va.) State Teachers College, 8 25 '32 / Harper's Mgz (June 1904), 121 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 104 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 71 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 93 / Hudson, F- T Miss, 17 / Hudson S/wJIfwJF-iM/Hmni 96; XLIV, 63 / McDonald, Slctd Mo F-S, 25 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 5 / Minish Mss. / Morris, F-S Fla, 421 / Niles, Anglo-Am Bid Stdy Bk, 14 / Niles, Bids Crls Tgc Lgds, 4 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 1 8 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, io/ Randolph, OzF-S, I, 122 / Randolph, The Ozarks, 1 80 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 167 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, iig / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 150 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 9 / SFLQ, VIII, 152 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 23 / Va FLS Bull, rfcs 3-5, 9 / Wheeler, Ky Mt F-S, 14 / Wyman Mss. # 1
Local Titles: A Moravian Song, A Woman Lived in a Far Country, Children's Song, Cruel Mother, The Beautiful Bride, The Ladie Bright, The Lady and the Children Three, The Lady Gains, The (A) Lady Gay, The Lone Widow, The Three Babies, (The) Three (Little) Babes.
Story Types: A: A mother sends her three children away to school in the north. They die there. Usually she grieves and prays for their return. At Christmas time they do come back. However, when she prepares a feast and a fine bed for them, they refuse her efforts to please them saying that such things are worldly pride and that the Saviour forbids such indulgence. At
dawn or on the summons of the Saviour they leave, telling the mother her tears but wet their winding sheets.
Examples: Cox (A), Davis (E), McGill.
B: The story is identical to that of Type A, but the inference is made by the children that it was the mother's "proud heart" that caused their deaths. Examples : SharpK (A, B).
Discussion: Zielonko, Some American Variants of Child Ballads , 104 ff. and Belden, Mo F-S, 55 6 discuss the American variations of this song in some detail. The latter lists six points in which the most common American texts differ from the Child A, B, C series: I. The revenants are children, often girls, and not grown boys ; 2. there is no cursing of the waters, but the mother usually prays for the children's return; 3. the ghosts refuse earthly pleasures in some cases because the Saviour stands yonder; 4. the recall of the ghosts at the crowing of the cocks is omitted or occurs when the "chickens" crow, except in Irish texts; 5. the children leave home to learn their gramarye; 6. the folk idea that tears for the dead wet the winding sheets and disturb the peace is present. In addition, the fact that the ghostly nature of the children is frequently assumed in America without being definitely stated (see Davis, Trd Bid Fa, A) is an interesting proof of the belief in the "flesh and blood" reality of spirits. See Wimberly, Folklore in English and. Scottish Popular Ballads, 226. Zielonko, op. cit., 109 notes in connection with these points that there are three narrative elements interwoven into the American texts: the Unquiet Grave theme of the corpse disturbed by the mourning of the living; the moralistic punishment of pride theme from Child C; and the theme of the transformation of one dead man into three children.
The Type B texts seem to represent a confusion of the story, so that the new end contradicts the opening stanza in a way somewhat similar to the Edward-Twa Brothers fusion noted under Child 13 and 49. Other American variations worth note can be found in Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 9 where the children are sent to America and die on shipboard; in George P.
Jackson's Spiritual Folk Songs of Early America, 28, where it is pointed out that The Romish Lady has had an influence on the SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, version; in the incremental Haun, Co eke Cnty, 104 text; in Cox, F-S South, A text where the children return at New Year's time rather than Christmas time; and in the Minish Mss. where the children tell the mother
her tears will not wet their winding-sheets.
Belden, op. cit., 56 suspects a printed source for the American texts because of their marked similarities.
81. LITTLE MUSGRAVE AND LADY BARNARD
Texts: The American Songster (Cozzens, N.Y.) / Barry, JBrit Bids Me, 150 / Belden, Mo F-S, BrownCo\ll BFSSNE, III, 6; IV, 12; VII, 9/ Bull (75C#i62,#7/ Cambiaire, Ea Ttnn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 50 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 29 / Cox, F-S South, 94 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 1 1 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 289 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 63 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 48 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 135 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hgblds, 52 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 46 / Grapurcbat, East Radford (Va.) State Teachers College, 8 25 '32 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 73 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplchns, 65 / JAFL, XXIII,
371 ; XXV, 182; XXX, 309; XLII, 265 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 27 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 14, 88 / Notes from ike Pine Mt. Settlement School, Harlan County, Ky., 1935, VII, :Ji/Perry, CarterCnty, 1 05 / PMLA, XXXIX, 470 /Randolph, Oz F-S, 1, 124 /Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 143 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #20 / Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 161 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 125 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 26 / Va FLS Bull, #s 3, 6, 7, 9, 11 / Univ. West Virginia Studies, III (Philological Papers, II), 14 / Wyman and Brockway, 20 Ky Mt Sgs, 22, 62. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 32.
Local Titles: Lord Banner, Lord Daniel, Lord Darnell, Lord Darnold, Lord Valley, Lord Vanover, Lord Arnold (Banner, Daniel, Donald, Orland, Vanner)'s Wife, Little (Young) Matthew (Mathy, Matha, Matly, Mose) Grove(s), Little Mosie Grove (Grew), Little Musgrave and Lady Barnswell, The Red Rover.
Story Types: A: Matthew Groves attends church or a ball and catches the eye of Lord Arnold's wife who, even though pregnant in some versions, makes advances toward him and asks him to sleep with her that night. When he sees by the ring on her finger that she is the Lord's wife, he refuses, but consents when she assures him her husband is away. A page overhears
their plans and hurries off to inform the Lord. After blowing on his bugle (sometimes it is a friend of Matthew's in the Lord's retinue who blows the bugle against orders), Lord Arnold surprises the sleeping lovers in bed. He offers Matthew the best sword and then kills him in a fair fight. In some texts he regrets his act. However, he then slays his wife when she tells him
she loves Groves better than she loves him. In a group of texts the Lord plans suicide or says he will die in the near future.
Examples: Barry (Aa), Belden, Davis (A), Fuson.
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, but it is mentioned at the end that the Lord shall "be hanged tomorrow".
Examples: Chappell, Creighton, Smith (A).
C: The story is the same as that of Type A, but there is no cajoling of the lover by the lady or refusal by Matthew at the start. He embraces her at once, when she makes advances toward him. The page, seeing this, departs.
Examples: Henry, F-S So Hghlds (A).
Discussion: This ballad, as it has a pure oral tradition in America, offers the scholar an excellent subject for study. Several of the texts are outstanding, and identical versions have been found as far apart as Maine and Missouri (See Barry, Brit Bids Me, 17711. and JAFL, XXX, 315). Barry, op. cit. 9 iSoff. prints a long discussion of the ballad as a means of revealing how folk songs develop. His contention is that there are two versions (the Banner and the Arnold or Daniel: one containing the bugle blowing and the "away, Musgrave, away" refrain, the other mentioning King Henry) which split in Britain and developed independently in America. In connection with this argument, he points out (p. 182) that the American texts are more vivid
and incisive than Child's and probably older and decides that the song has been in this country over three hundred years.
The idea of a pre-American split is attacked point-blank by Helen Pettigrew (Univ. of West Virginia Studies III, Philological Papers II, 8ff.) She also disagrees with Barry's interpretation of the trip of the husband and discusses the American versions and variants farther. She indicates how few New World texts have the lady pregnant and that none (as do eight Child texts) have Musgrave blame the lady for the compromising situation when the lovers are discovered. In addition, she points out that the horn-blowing is still frequently retained over here (See MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, A, C; Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mick; Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, A; SharpK, Eng F-S So A-plchns, F) and attributes the visit to King Henry to American romanticization.
The American texts vary somewhat in their inclusion and exclusion of material, as do those in Child. Type A stories may begin at church (Child A, C, H), at a ball (BFSSNE, III, 6), or playing ball (Child D, E, K, L), although the letter-writing (Child G) does not seem to be in America. (Belden, Mo F-S 58 points out that the church-beginning characterizes southern American
texts, while the playing at ball, the northern.) The attempts to bribe the page are missing (Child C-F, H-L, O). The bugle-blowing scenes are faulty and, if included, disagree as to whether the Lord himself or a friend of Musgrave's warns the lover against orders. The Lord may or may not regret his act, and a few times, as in Child C and G, he commits suicide. Musgrave's
wife is omitted, but the pregnancy of Lady Barnard is frequently retained. The Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 50 version finds a close friend of the family taking the page's role.
Type B follows the ending of Child E, while Type C is perhaps closer to the spirit of the British texts than the other American versions. The lady is never as aggressive in England as she is on this side of the ocean. Nevertheless, no American song that I have seen contains the barbaric torture to be found in Child A, nor do any indicate clearly a past affair between the
lovers. However, see Type C.
For a discussion of this ballad in Jamaica see PMLA, XXXIX, 455 ff.
The song is generally considered "dirty" by folk-singers. Check the headnotes in Randolph, Oz F-S 9 I.
83. CHILD MAURICE
Texts: Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 25.
Local Titles: Gil Morissy.
Story Types: A: A lady receives a letter from Gil Morissy and is so pleased her husband gets very jealous. He goes outside and finds the youth combing his yellow hair, challenges him to a battle, and kills him. The lady, who was the boy's mother, laments over the grave. The husband regrets his rash act on hearing the lament.
Examples : Greenleaf and Mansfield.
Discussion: The Canadian version, which was recited and not sung, is condensed, but fairly inclusive in its coverage of the story outline.
84. BONNY BARBARA ALLEN
Texts: Adventure Mgz, 4 lo '25, 4 10 '26 / Allen, Cowboy Lore, jj American Songster (Kenedy, Baltimore, 1836), 7 / Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 33 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 195 / Berea Quarterly, XVIII, 12 / Beadle's Dime Songs of the Olden lime (N.Y., 1863), 38 / Belden, Mo F-S, 60 / Boletin Latino Americano de Musica, V, 280 / Botkin, Treasry Am F-L, 820 / Botsford, Sgs of Amcas, 26 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 99 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, II, # i, 234; IV, #3, 73 / Bull U SCdfr 162, #8 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 66 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 32 / Charley Fox's MinstreVs Companion (Turner & Fisher, Philadelphia) / Cox, F-S South, 96 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 305 / Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 204 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 302 / Downes and Siegmeister, Treasry Am Sg, 34 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 69 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 53 / Everybody's Songster (Sanford and Lott, Cleveland, 1839) / Farm Life, March 1927 / Fauset, F-L N Sc, 1 13 / Focus, III, 445; IV, 10 1, 1 60; V, 282 / The Forget-me-not Songster (Turner & Fisher, Philadelphia), 129 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hghlds, 47 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 50 / Gordon, F-S Am, 69 / Grapurchat, East Radford (Va.) State Teachers College, 8 25 '32 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea SgsNewfdld, 26 / Harper's Mgz (June 1888), 35; (May 1915), 907 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 62 / Heart Songs, 247 / Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 12 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 82 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplchns, 248 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 95 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 14 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-S, # 13 / Hummel, Oz F-S / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, VI, 132; XIX, 286;
XX, 256; XXII, 63; XXVI, 352; XXVIII, 144; XXIX, 160, 1985 XXXV, 343; XXXIX, 97, 211 ; XLII, 268, 303; XLV, 13; XLVI, 28; XLVIII, 310; XLIX, 207; LII, 77 / JFSS, I, 265 / Kennedy, Effects Isolation, 320 / Ky Cnties Mss. / Kincaid, Fav Mt Bids, 14 / Kolb, Treasry F-S, 2 / Leach-Beck Mss. / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 163 / Lomax, Adv Bid Hunter, 243 / Luther, Amcns Their Sgs, 15 / Macintosh, So III F-S, 7 1 MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 35 / MacKenzie, Quest Bid, 100 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 23 / McDonald, SelctdF-S Mo, 30 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 40 / Minish Mss. / Musical Quarterly, II, 121 5 IV, 296 / Morris, F-S Fla, 428 /
Musick, F-L Kirksmlle, 6 / Neal, Brown Cnty, 52 / Neely and Spargo, Tales Sgs So III, 137 / N.J. Journal Educ., XVI, #6, 7 / N.Y. broadside: H. J. Wehman #395, Harvard Univ. Library / NTFLQ, II, 55; IV, ijg/N.r. Times, 10-9- '27; Niles, Anglo-Am Bid Stdy Bk, 18 / Niles, More Sgs Hill-Flk, 6 / North American Review, CCXXVIII, 219-20 / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 30 / 162 Popular Songs (Vickery, Augusta, 1895) / Ozark Life V, #7 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 140 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 7 / Pound, Nehr Syllabus, 9 / PTFLS, VII, in;X, i6l&ame, LandSddleBags, 115 / Randolph, 0* F-S,1, 126/Randolph, TbeOzarks, 183 / Rayburn, Oz Cntry, 232 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 57 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 59 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 83 / Scott, Sing Am, 56 / Sewanee Review, XIX, 315; SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #21 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 191 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 127 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 122 / SFLQ, II, ji / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 129 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 30 / Stout, F-L la, $/The Pearl Songster (Huestis, N.Y., 1846), 104 / The Southern Warbler (Charleston, 1845), 275 / The Virginia Warbler (Richmond, 1845), 275 / The Vagabonds, Old Cabin Songs for Fiddle and Bow, n. d., 7 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 94 / Thomas, Sngin Gatbrn, 6 /Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtcbs, 377 / Trifet's Monthly Budget of Music, 1892 / Univ. of Virginia Mgz (April 1913), 329 / Va FLS Butt, #s 210 / Wheeler, Ky Mt F-S, 39 / Wilson, Bckaods Am, 99 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, I.
Local Titles: Ballet of Barbara Allen, Barbara Allen (both names with many variants), Barbara Allen's Cruelty, Barbara Ellen, Barbarous Ellen, Edelin, Hard-hearted Barbery Ellen, (The Sad Ballet of) Little Johnnie Green, Sir John Graham, The Love of Barbara Allen.
Story Types: A: A young man lies on his death-bed for the love of Barbara Allen. He requests a servant to bring her to him (the man usually delivers the message in person, though in some texts a letter is sent). She comes without too much enthusiasm and remarks that the lover looks as though he were dying. In response to his pleadings, she accuses him of slighting her in
tavern-toasting or at a ball. He defends himself, but she continues to scorn him. He dies of remorse. Later, when she hears the funeral bells, she repents and dies. Sometimes the rose-briar theme is added.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (E); Davis (A); SharpK (A).
B: The story is like that of Type A, but the lover accepts Barbara's scorn without offering a defense to any accusations that are stated. Not all these texts have accusations.
Examples: Belden (K), Brewster (A), Davis (J).
C: The same story as that of Type A, but the lover acknowledges the justice of Barbara's charge.
Examples: JAFL, XX, 256.
D: The story may follow Type A or B, but the lover curses Barbara in the end. Examples: Brewster (D), Eddy (A), Davis (Q).
E: This type resembles Type D, but Barbara curses the lover in return.
Examples: Davis (P).
F: The story may be of either the A or B type, but the man lavishes gifts on Barbara in direct contrast to her cruelty.
Examples: Davis (S, T); JAFL, XXIX, 161; NTFLQ, II, 55.
G: The story is like that of Type A or B, although the mother (or both parents) is usually blamed by Barbara for causing her to be cruel and the mother (or both mothers) joins the lovers in death.
Examples: Davis (W); Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts (F); SharpK (B, C)
H : The story is the same as that of Type A, but a view is given of the courtship where Sir James the Graeme (See Child 213) tells Barbara she will be mistress of seven ships if she marries him. He then slights her at the tavern, and the regular story ensues.
Examples: MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc (A).
I: A Negro version exists which, in its fragmentary form, reveals that "Boberick Allen" is a man. The other girls can't see why "I" follow him. He goes to town and back attempting to see "me" follow him, but he can't because "I was away somewhere".
Examples: PTFLS, VII, m ; X, 149 (C).
Discussion: The popularity of this song is undoubtedly due to its inclusion in ten or more early nineteenth century songbooks and on innumerable broadsides. Certainly it is extreme in its number of texts and minor variations, although the basic story outline is amazingly consistent.
In America, the girl's name seldom varies much beyond the to-be-expected spelling changes, but that of her lover takes many forms: the first name may be William, Willie, James, Jemmy, Jimmy, John, etc.; and the last name, often not given, Grove, Groves, Green, Grame, Graham, Hilliard, Ryley, Rosie, etc. The rose-briar motif is frequently found, even though it is not in Child's texts, sometimes with the names Lord Thomas and Fair Eleanor (Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, F) or Sweet William being present as well. If this ending is lacking, another conventional close such as the "turtle dove and sparrow" stanza ( SharpK, Eng F-S Aplcbns, D) or "a warning to all virgins" (Davis, Trd Bid 7 a, M) usually is substituted. The time of year is most often May as in Child B, but Martinmas (Child A) and autumn (Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich) are not uncommon. For detailed discussions of various texts of this song, see Davis, op. cit., 3024; C. A. Smith in the Mttsical Quarterly, II, 109; and MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 35 in particular. However, most of the early editors devote some time to this ballad.
The important narrative changes are included in the story types above. The main story variations center about the actions of Barbara and her lover concerning the accusation, defense, and parting. The Child story is simpler than that of most of the American versions. The curse of the lover on Barbara, the lavishing of gifts by the lover on Barbara, Barbara's curse of the lover, the lover's acknowledgement of the justice of Barbara's charges, the onstage views of the courtship, the parental problems, and the suicide of the motter(s) are all absent in Child and enter with the broadside and songbook texts and the subsequent widespread oral tradition. The mitigation of the cruelty reflected in Types C and G is typical. Type I reflects a complete degeneration and has been discussed in my descriptive essay. In general, in America, Barbara is remorseful, the lover denies the slighting or mention of the slighting is omitted, and the lover accepts his fate objectively more or less as in Child A and B.
Other minor, but notable, variations include the attempt of the lover to embrace Barbara, who avoids him, in some texts, by "skipping all over the room" (see SharpK, op. cit., B); Barbara's riding out of town on a white horse, the information that she is "a poor blacksmith's daughter" and her lover "the richest man in Stonington" being included (see Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtcbs, 379); the basin of blood or tears by the bed (see the Mich., Me., Newf., and other northern versions); and the shift of person (first to third) by the narrator (see Davis, op. cit., D; Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 50; and Child B).
Newell, Games and Songs of American Children, 78 cites Barbara Allen as an old New England child's game and evening party dance. He gives no text. Also see Botkin, Am Play- Party Sg, 58.
Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 68 notes that there is a very old Spanish romance with the same theme. However, the motif is a universally popular one. See WF, VIII, 371 for a Serbian variation.
85. LADY ALICE
Texts: Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 44 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 452 (trace) / Brown Coll / Bull lenn FLS, IV, #3, 75 / Bull U SC # 162, #9 / Cambiaire, Ea Venn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 76 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 33 / Child, II, 279 / Combs, F-S Ky HgUds, 8 / Cox, F-S South, no / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLVI, 124 / Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 125 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 346 / Focus, III, 154; IV, $o / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 53 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 71 / Henry, Beech MtF-S, 2 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 89 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplcbns, 47 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 107 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 7 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-S, #14 / JAFL, XXVIII, 1515 XXXII, 500; XXXIX, 1025 LII, 47; LVIII, 75 / Morris, F-S Fla, 441 / N. T. 'Times Mgz, 1 1 17 '40 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 201 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, I39/ Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 1 17 / Sharp C, EngF-S So Aplchns, 4^22 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 196 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 142 / The Survey, XXXIII, 373 / Va FLS Bull, #82-10.
Local titles: A Lover's Farewell, Johnny (John) Collins, John Harman, George Collins (Collands, Colon, Colcman, Allien, Promer, Collen, Collum, Carey, Collie), Giles Collins, Young Collins.
Story Types: A: Johnny Collins rides out one day and meets a sweetheart washing a white marble stone. (She is his fairy love.) She warns him of his impending death. He leaps in the water and swims homeward. Convinced that he will die that night, Collins requests to be buried by the marble stone. After he dies, his mortal true-love sees the funeral coming. She halts the
procession, kisses the corpse, and trims her own shroud before dying.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (A, B); JAFL, LVIII, 75; Davis (A, B).
B: Giles Collins comes home one night, is taken ill, and dies. His sweetheart, upon hearing the news, goes to his grave, opens the coffin, and kisses him. Her mother tries to be philosophical about the affair, but to no avail.
Examples: Cox, F-S South, (C, D); Davis (C, D); SharpK (A).
C: The story follows that of Type B at the start. However, the girl interrupts the funeral and then joins her lover in death. The lily-north wind motif (see Child B) is often in this version.
Examples : Hudson, F-S Miss (A).
D: A lyric song rises from the stanza so often found in Lady Alice about the "snow-white dove" on "yonder pine" mourning for his love. A second stanza of the "go dig my grave wide and deep" sort completes the lyric.
Examples: Gardner and Chickering.
Discussion: Samuel P. Bayard, using Barbara M. Cra'ster's article (JFSS IV, 106) for leads, states (JAFL, LVIII, 73 ff.) convincingly that Johnny Collins as it is printed by him (p. 75. See also Cox, F-S South, A and B) represents the full form of the early European Clerk Colvill story infiltrated by ballad conventionality and Celtic lore. The British Clerk Colvill (Child 42),
the Giles Collins versions of Lady Alice, and the abbreviated Johnny Collins version of the same song can be considered to tell only portions of the original narrative. Moreover, in modern versions of Johnny Collins an attempt has been made by folk-singers who have forgotten the meaning of the old story to rationalize the supernatural lover and the mortal girl who mourns
Johnny's death to be one person.
The original story behind Johnny Collins, Clerk Colvill and Giles Collins "fragments" then is that of a man who renounces his fairy lover for a mortal girl, meets the fairy, and learns he is to have his life exacted as revenge for his faithlessness. (Bayard conjectures that the elf-woman has been replaced by a mermaid in Clerk Colvill and by "a washer at the ford" in Johnny
Collins, the latter entering the story from Gaelic lore while the ballad existed in Ireland. Harbison Parker, JAFL, LX, 265 ft, considers incorrect a belief in either the Irish tradition of the songs or the Gaelic banshee characteristics of the supernatural lover and states convincingly (to the satisfaction of Dr. Bayard, I understand) that a Scandanavian-Shetland-Orkney-Scottish series of locales and the accompanying selkie lore accounts for the actions of the mermaid or fairy lover and, in Clerk Colvill, possibly even for the title itself.) In any case, after embracing his mistress the young man swims ashore and goes home, where he is, quite naturally, apprehensive that he is about to die. He requests to be buried near the stone at the foot of the fairy hill. He then dies. His mortal lover sees the funeral, stops the procession when she learns the dead person is her lover, and states that she too will die of a broken heart.
Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 53 print the "dove and pine" stanza that is so frequently found at the end of the American texts of Lady Alice and another conventional phrase as a song (see Type D) derived from Lady Alice. Though these conventional "dove" phrases are of the sort that might derive from any number of sources (see JAFL, XXXIX, 149 and Thomas, Sngin Gathrn, 34), Gardner and Chickering put forth a fairly convincing defense of their stand. The "dove" stanza does appear in Child 85 in West Virginia (Cox, F-S South), Virginia (Davis, Trd Bid Fa), Mississippi (Hudson, F-S Miss), North Carolina (Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplchns), etc. as well as in the JAFL, XXXIX, 104 and XXVIII, 152 texts. See Gardner and Chickering, op. cit., for other references.
Types A and B are the usual American forms of the story, while Type C follows the Child A, B story closely and utilizes the conventional ending of B. See also Child, III, 515.
There are many parodies of the song, and one version, Giles Scroggins, was a great favorite in early nineteenth century America. See Davis, op. cit., 352; Randolph, OzF-S, I, 140; Heart Songs, 246; The New England Pocket Songster (Woodstock, Vt.); The Singer's Own Book (Woodstock, Vt., 1838); The Songster's Companion (Brattleborough, Vt., 1815); The Isaiah Thomas Collection in Worcester, Mass., #95; and Worthington Ford, Broadside Bids, etc. Mass, #3126.
The Randolph, op. cit., I version, though called George Collins and containing the "dove 55 stanzas like so many of the Type B stories, seems to be closer to Johnny Collins in narrative.
86. YOUNG BENJIE
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 453 reports that a Maine woman recognized this ballad as one she had heard in her childhood in Ireland.
87. PRINCE ROBERT
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 453 (trace) / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 138.
Local Titles: Harry Saunders.
Story Types: A: A man marries against his mother's wishes. Leaving his bride at his new home, he returns to visit his mother. She poisons him. His wife, when he does not return, rides to the mother's home and interrupts the funeral. She requests her husband's watch and chain, but is perfectly willing to forfeit his money and land. The mother refuses to grant the request, and
the girl falls to kissing the corpse. She collapses and dies of a broken heart.
Examples: Combs.
Discussion: The Kentucky text, although in it the ring is replaced by the watch and chain and the poisoned wine by tea, is similar to the Child texts in story. However, the rose-briar motif, found in Child A and B, is absent.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 454 notes that a Maine women recognized the song as one she heard in her youth in Ireland.
88. YOUNG JOHNSTONE
Texts: MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 4.1.
Local Titles: Johnson and Coldwell, Johnson and the Colonel.
Story Types: A: Johnson kills the Colonel after the latter has made slurring remarks about Johnson's sister. He then flees to this sister's house, but when she says that he will surely be hanged in the morning he rides off to the home of his true-love, the Colonel's sister. His sweetheart hides him. When the King's guards come after Johnson and describe him, his hawks,
and his hounds to the girl, she tells them that he passed the house earlier. After they hasten off, she goes to tell Johnson of her service, startles the sleeping man, and is stabbed. He immediately regrets his rash and unplanned act and promises her the best doctors. However, she dies, nobly.
Examples: MacKenzie (A).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A. However, Johnson goes in sequence to his mother, sister, and sweetheart. Each asks him where he has been. To each he replies "at the state house teaching young Clark to write". Each then tells him of a bloody dream she has had, and he is forced to confess the crime.
Examples: MacKenzie (B).
Discussion: MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 41 states that he cannot account for the variations that occur in his A text, although he points out that in the absence of the dream and of the description of the hawk, it resembles Child C. Type B is like Child D. Johnson's reply to the girl, when she asks him where he has been ("the young Clark to write" line) is also discussed here.
90. JELLON GRAME
Reed Smith prints this song in his list of American survivals of the Child ballads in America. See SFLQ, I, #2, 9 ii; Davis, FS Fa.
92. BONNY BEE HOM
SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 200 refers his readers to this ballad in connection with his version of The Lowlands of Holland. See also Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 173 and Gray, Sgs Bids Me L'jks, 88. Also, check Child, II, 317 (headnote) where similarities of certain stanzas in the two songs is noted.
93. LAMKIN
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me> 200 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 122 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, # 3, 75 / ChappeU, F-S Rnke Alb, 76 / Child, III, 5 1 5 ; V, 295 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 354 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 59 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 313 / Marion H. Gray, The Flight of the Ballad A Woman's Department Club Ballad, Terre Haute, Part 3, 4 10 '30, 4 I Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 20 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 91 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplclns, 62 / Jones, F-LMich, 5 / JAFL, XIII, 117; XXIX, 162; XXXV, 3445 XLIV, 61; XL VIII, 316; LII, 70 / Lmscott, F-S Old NE, 303 / E. H. McClure, McClures and Mayers
(private), Detroit, '42, 3 / N. J, Journal Educ., XIX, 4J= i, 9 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 205 / Randolph, 0% F-S, 1, 141 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns, #23 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 201 / SFLQ, V, 13.7 / V* FLS Bull, #s 3, 9.
Local Titles: Boab King, Bolakin, Beau (Bow, Bo) Lamkin(s), Bold Lantern (Dunkins, Hamkins), (The) False Lambkin, False Linfinni Lamkin, Lampktn, Ward Laznpkin, Young Alanthia,
Story Types: A: Lamkin, a mason, does some work for a lord and is not paid. The lord, leaving home for a time, fears trouble. He orders his house sealed to protect his family. Lamkin, seeking revenge, gets in through some opening left by accident or with the assistance of a nurse. Most of the servants are away. At the nurse's advice, he hurts the baby in order to get the mother downstairs. When the lady of the house comes, Lamkin seizes her. She offers him gold and even her daughter in marriage to save her own life. But Lamkin scorns these bribes and gloats over his plan to murder her. He makes the
nurse or the servants clean a silver basin to hold the lady's blood. The lord returns to find the house red with gore and only his daughter, who was warned by the mother to stay hidden, surviving. Lamkin is hung or burned, and the nurse, burned or hung.
Examples: Davis (A), Linscott, SharpK (B).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A 5 but Lamkin, when not paid, builds a false window in the house. He enters through this window to commit the crimes.
Examples: Gardner and Chickering (A); JAFL, LII, 70; Randolph.
C: The story is abbreviated so that only the baby is slain, and it is his blood that is caught in the silver bowL
Examples: JAFL, XIII, 117.
D : The story is the same as that of Type A, except that it is suggested that there was a love affair between Lamkin and the lady before the marriage. Thus, Lamkin had sworn revenge on the lord for winning his girl. Lamkin gets in by persuading the nurse the baby is crying, and the nurse becomes innocently suspected and punished.
Examples: Davis (B).
Discussion: The American story is similar in basic outline to the Child B, C, F group (see Child, II, 320 I), although certain differences should be noted. The offer of the daughter's hand as a bribe, and the large role given the daughter (Child F, T, X) are common in America. The false window built by the mason (Child E) can also be found with: some frequency (Type
B), while the. catching of the baby's blood in the bowl (Type C) seems to occur as a result of combined story degeneration and reconstruction. The Type D text does not appear much different from the usual Type A story. However, Davis, Trd Bid Va y 357 (headnote) makes clear that the singer believed that there had been- a love affair between the lady and the mason,
although this conception is not consistent with the normal opening line, "Why need I reward Lampkin?" The idea that the daughter, Betsy, is away at school and has to be sent for was also added as a footnote by the singer of this version. See Barry, Brit Bids Me, 204 for a textual study of seven American and British variants of the Child F version.
Two American texts are worth particular attention. The Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 315, B version never gets as far as the murder or the hanging of Lamkin, and, although certainly not complete, is unusual as the most dramatically active portion is the forgotten portion. The Chappell, F-S Rnke All, 76 text contains a splice between the "spare me" lines of the lady and some love song on the general theme of the opening scene of Young Hunting (Child 68). The seven resultant stanzas are pointless.
Fannie Eckstrom (J4FL, LII, 74) offers Phillips Barry's explanation of the source of this song by means of the False Linfinn title. In Irish folklore, a leper (called "white" man) could be cured by the blood of an innocent person collected in a silver bowl. Barry feels that the Irish mason, who was reputed to use human blood in the mixing of his cement, was rationalized
into the ballad after the fear of lepers had vanished.
For a discussion of the change in names from Bold Lamkin to Boab King, see Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 91.
95. THE MAID FREED FROM THE GALLOWS
Texts: American Speech, I, 247 / Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 48 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 206, 381 / Belden, Mo F-S, XV, 66 / Boletin Latino Americano de Musica, V, 281 / Botkin, Treasry Am F-L, 822 / Brown Coll / Bull U SC# 162, # 10 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 15 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 35 / Child, V, 296 / Cox, F-S South, 115; Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 29 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 297 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 360 / Downes and Siegmeister, Treasry Am Sg, 44 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 77 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 62 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 118 / Fuson, Bids Ky Hghlds, 1 13 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 146 / Grapurchat, East Radford (Va.) State Teachers College, 8 25 '32 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 99 / Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 18 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 96 / Hummel, Oz F-S I Hudson, F-S Miss, in / Hudson, F-T Miss, 19 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #15 / Jeckyll,7a^w SgStry, 58 / JAFL, XIX, 22; XXI, 56; XXVI, 175; XXVII, 64; XXX!, 319; XXXIX, 105;XLII, 272; XLVIII, 312; LVI, 242 IJFSS, V, 231 / Kittredge, Cambridge Ed. Child 95 Blds, xxv / Kolb, Treasry F-S, i6/Lomax, Cowboy Sgs Frntr Bids, 159 (another song)/ Mason, Cannon Cnty, 20 / Minish Mss. / Morris, F-S Fla, 444 / Musical Quarterly, II, i I4ff. /
N.J. Journal of Education, XV, #6, #7 / Ozark Life, VI, #2 / Owens, "studies Tex F-S, 26 / Parsons, F-T Andres Is, 152 / Parsons, F~L Sea Is, 189 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 154, 304 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 143 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 72 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 35ff. / Scarborough, Sngctchr So Hghlds, 196 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, 4^24 / Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplchns, 1, 208 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 144 (see Chapter VIII also) / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 37 / SFLQ, II, 71 / Speculum, XVI, #2, 236 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 164 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Bnchs, 397 / Va FLS Bull, #s 26, 8 10 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, 44.
Local Titles: By a Lover Saved, Down By the Green Willow Tree, Hangman Hold Your Rope, Hold Your Hands Old Man, O Judges, The Gallows Tree, The Gallis Pole, The Gallant Tree, The Golden Ball, The Hangman (Hangerman, Hangsman), The Hangman's Son, The Hangman's Song, The Hangman's Tree, The Maid (Girl) Freed from the Gallows, The Scarlet Tree, The Sycamore Tree, The True Love Freed from the Gallows, True Love.
Story Types: A: A girl, at the gallows, is about to be hung. She requests the hangman to stop the proceedings as she sees a member of the family (usually the father) coming. She asks her father if he has gold or fee, etc. to set her free. He says he has not; he has come to see her hung. This sequence of questions and answers goes on through the girl's relations (usually mother, brother, sister; sometimes, uncle, grandmother, cousin, etc.) until the sweetheart comes and replies that he has brought the fee to free her. In a few texts he has a knife to cut the rope.
Examples: Barry (I), Davis (A), Smith (A).
B: The sequence of events is similar to that of Type A, but an offense of which the girl is guilty is hinted at. This usually connects with golden ball- virginity legend.
Examples: Barry (II), Davis (K), SharpK (B).
C : The usual story is told, but the sex of the prisoner is male.
Examples: Belden, Davis (E), Randolph (D).
D: Dr. Maurice Gallagher of the Romance Language Department at the University of Pennsylvania recalls having heard a text sung in Texas in 1916 in which a man waited in vain for the usual rescue and was eventually hung.
No examples.
E: The story is the same as that of Type A, except the fate of the girl is uncertain and there is a touching plea to the lover in the last four lines.
Examples: Eddy (A).
F: There are a few texts where badman ballads have taken over the Maid Freed from the Gallows motif. In one, a man sees his sweetheart through a train window (probably with another man), commits murder, and is sentenced to hang. In another, a similar, but not identical situation exists, and the girl rescues her lover from the gallows. In the third, the conventional "Fve killed no man, robbed no train, and done no hanging crime" prefaces the ballad.
Examples (in order): Hudson, F-S Miss (D); Henry, F-S So Hghlds (E); Fuson.
G: This type contains stanzas directed by the girl at the Saviour, who does not answer, complaining that her golden lands will be taken when she is in Eternity and that no one loves her. The true-love, Edward, appears. She says, and he-repeats, that he has no gold; nevertheless, he loves her and will set her free. The lovers then forgive the parents, but hope the brother is hung.
Examples : Haun.
Discussion: There are detailed discussions of the history of this ballad in Reed Smith, SC Bids, Chapter VIII and in Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 35 ff. Consult also Erich PohTs article in FFC, $105, 1265. Child, II, 346ff. and Sager, Mod Phil, XXVII, I29ff. discuss the whole European tradition and the German parallels respectively Child, II, 346 expressing the opinion that the English versions are all "defective and distorted". See Child, IV, 482 for further references. Also consult NTFLQ, II, 139 for an Italian version beginning "Sailors do not drown me" and SFLQ, V, 25 for a discussion of a Rumanian analogue.
In Europe the song invariably centers about some variation of a theme concerning a girl's capture by corsairs or a hero's imprisonment. In Britain and America the antecedent action, if mentioned at all, ties up with a crime the conventional loss of a golden ball, key, or comb, possibly representing virginity. See Broadwood, JFSS, V, 231; Kittredge, JAFL, XXX, 319; Scarborough, of. cit., 38. Belden, Mo F-S, 66 notes this song's importance in the study of ballad origins. Many of the forces of variation have worked on it, although its incremental repetition (see Kittredge's edition of Child's Ballads, xxv) has served to keep the framework intact.
The American story types, usually with a hangman (Child G) instead of a judge, are large in number, although the structure of the song has remained amazingly constant. Type A tells the usual British story, and Type B seems to illustrate the manner in which a ballad can contact popular tale (see Child G, H). The Type C "sex reversal" is most likely a sentimental mitigation of
the tragedy. If so, in Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, B this change in mood is carried one step farther. There the mother rescues her son, because mother love is stronger than "sweetheart love". See Duncan, op. cit., 76. Such "sex reversals" are the rule in the Slavic countries and in America occur most often in the South. Type D does not follow the tradition of the story and in
its failure to reverse the progression possesses a dramatically weak conclusion, while Type E (which could result in Type D if reconstructed by the folk) is simply incomplete. The Type F degenerations ally themselves with the Lomax, Cowboy Sgs Frntr Bids, text which is a curious adaption of The Maid Freed from the Gallows motif to the life of the West called Bow Down
Tour Head an' Cry. Type F is discussed in some detail by Barry and Henry in the latter's F-S So Hghlds, See also Morris, F-S Fla, 449, D version. Type G, which allies itself with the Scottish Child I text in the lack of gold and the curse on the brother, is treated at length by Haun in Cocke Cnty, 31. The Thompson, Bdy Bts JSrtchs, 397 text shows some affinities with this story type.
The story itself has taken a number of forms in America. It is, particularly with negroes, popular as a drama (Davis, ?rd Sid Fa, 361, Scarborough, op. A 9 39; Reed Smith, op. cit., 85 ff.) and is also found as a children's game (Davis, op. cit., 361; JAFL, XXX, 319; Botkin, Am Play Party Sg, 62; Smith, op. cit., 88 ff. See also Child F). It exists as a prose tale in the United States and West Indies and upon occasion has been developed as a cante-fable. (See Smith, op. cit., Chapter VIII). These stories vary widely. Parsons, F-2" Andros Is, 152 prints a cante-f able where a girl goes away to school, falls in love against her stepmother's wish, is falsely accused of theft, and is sentenced to hang. Beckwith, PMLA, XXXIX, 475 prints a Jamaica version in which an engaged princess breaks a family rule and is to be hung. Her future husband comes with a great chariot, smashes the gallows, and rescues her. (For more Jamaican texts, see Jeckyll, Jamcn Sg Stry, 58 ff.) And Mary Owen, Voodoo Tales, 185 ff. found the song material used as a part of a Missouri story of a negro girl with a magic golden ball that made her white. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 2103 disputes the idea that the cante-fable and game stages are the last steps in the song's deterioration, and Russell Ames (JAFL, LVI, 242) discusses Leadbelly's version which the latter has developed from cante-fables.
Barry, op. cit., Sgff. prints three secondary versions of this song from Maine. Hudson, F-S Miss, 113 maintains his E version, which contains a borrowed stanza at the end, to be a parody. The text is fragmentary, however.
For studies relating this ballad to negro songs, see Reed Smith, SC Bids, Chapter. VIII and Musical Quarterly, II, H4ff.
96. THE GAY GOSHAWK
Reed Smith prints this song among his list of American survivals of the Child ballads. See SFLQ, I, 52, 911. Check also the Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N. S., VII, 73 98.
99. JOHNIE SCOT
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 213 / Green Mountain Songster , 41 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 109 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 100 / JAFL, XLII, 273 / Kennedy, Effects Isolation, 321 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #25 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 215 / Wilson, Bckwds Am, 94.
Local Titles: Johnie Scot, Johnny Scots.
Story Types: A: Johnie Scot, out hunting or in service at the English court, gets a princess or noble lady with child. He returns to the North, but she is locked up by her father. After he writes and asks her to join him (sometimes this is omitted), she requests or the King summons him to come to England. He sets out to rescue the girl. As Johnie approaches the castle
he sees his love looking out. At the court, the King scorns the force that has accompanied Johnie from his home and sentences them to hang. Johnie, however, prefers to fight, and the King brings forth an Italian champion to duel Johnie. The Italian is slain, and the King is so impressed that he frees the girl and gives his permission for the marriage. In some texts Johnie
returns to Scotland, not only married, but as King.
Examples: Barry (A, B); Haun; JAFL, XLII, 273.
B: The story, if garbled, is like that of Type A, except that Johnie attacks the King (in this case Henry) and kills him along with his guards. He then takes the girl home with him.
Examples: SharpK (B).
Discussion; The Type A versions are generally similar to those in Child, but the SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, B, Type B text seems to be unique. The SharpK, op. cit., C text may be of the same sort, however, although it is too incomplete to tell. The idea that King Henry flees, found in some versions, is American.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 222 ff. breaks the Type A texts into two main divisions according to the minor details of the story, and he also notes that the Maine Lord of Salvary (B) is the result of contact with a similar Breton ballad, Les Aubrays. See also Child, II, 378.
The document of Rev. Andrew Hall (Interesting Roman Antiquities, etc., 1823, p. 216) which Child quotes, II, 378 and SharpK, op. cit. requotes, 418, reveals a story of the court of Charles II where a Scot, James Macgill, fought a professional Italian gladiator who leaped over him as if to "swallow him" and was "spitted" in mid-air. "Italian" becomes "taveren", "taillant", and
the verb "swallow", a bird.
The Green Mountain Songster text lacks mention of the Italian, a feature also missing in Child Q and R.
100. WILLIE O WINSBURY
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 224 / BFSSNE, IX, 6 / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 140 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 28.
Local Titles: John Barbour, Young Barbour.
Story Types: A: A girl is observed to be ailing by her father, the King. He suspects correctly that she is with child, although she denies it at first. The king wishes to know the man's rank, and, upon learning the lover is one of his Spanish servingmen or one of his seven sea boys, he orders the lad to be hung. The girl pleads for her lover. The lover, when brought before the King,
so impresses the latter with his physical beauty that he is forgiven and offered gold, land and the girl's hand in marriage. He accepts the girl, but refuses the material wealth as he is rich himself.
Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield (A, B).
Discussion: The ballad is extremely popular in Newfoundland, but rare in the United States. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 221 found a fragment in his B version of Jobnie Scot (99), and there is an incomplete West Virginia text which ends with the girl pleading for her lover. The Vermont (BFSSNE) text is not complete either, and no reason is given for the King's change of heart. Also, the lover is "first down" (instead of being last, as usual).
The American versions follow the Child story. See Child, II, 398.
101. WILLIE DOUGLAS DALE
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 454 notes that a Maine woman recognized the whole song, but could not repeat any of it.
105. THE BAILIFFS DAUGHTER OF ISLINGTON
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 225 / Belden, Mo F-S, 68 / Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 307/ Davis, Trd Bid Va, 383 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Vt^ 6 / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 74 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sngstr, 61 / Focus, V, 280 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 34 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 1 14 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 4 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, # 1 6 / JAFL, XXX, 321; XXXIX, 106 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, i6o/Morris, F-SFla, 453 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 219 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / SFLQ, VIII, \Va FLS Bull, #4.
Local Titles: The Bailiff's Daughter, The Bailiffs Daughter of Islington, The Bailor's Daughter, The Comely Youth, There Was a Youth, True Love Requited.
Story Types: A: A loving youth and the very coy bailiff's daughter have been parted for seven years. She had scorned him because she did not feel he really loved her, and his family had sent him away from "his fond and foolish pride". Sometimes, she has been locked up, also. The girl, however, disguises herself in rags, slips off, and goes in quest of her lover. She meets him along the way. When he asks if she knows the bailiffs daughter in her town, she replies that the girl has been dead for a long while. He then says he will go away to a far-off land. On hearing this she reveals her identity and promises to marry him. Sometimes the marriage is included.
Examples: Barry, Davis (A), SharpK (A).
B: The story outline is the same as that of Type A, but the' girl does not disguise herself as a beggar. Rather, she dresses in fine silk and asks for a kiss instead of a penny. The lad buys the girl jewels, and they have a merry wedding. Examples : Hudson, F-S Miss.
Discussion: The Type A stories are similar to Child, but shorter. They derive from print and are generally quite stable. Type B, however, seems to reveal a rather undramatic change that has taken place in the original narrative. However, see Alfred Williams, F-S Uffer Thames, 174 (head-note).
Flanders, New Gn Mt Sngstr, 63 discusses the stability and scope of this ballad in America. For two unique stanzas see this article. See also her Garl Gn Mt Sg, 74 text that follows Child 105 a closely. In addition, A. C. Morris, (SFLQ, VII, 155) notes some interesting intrusions of "cracker" language into the text.
Isabel Rawn (JAFL, XXIX, 201) prints a not uncommon song from Georgia concerning a soldier (or sailor) who returns (at first unknown) to his wife after seven years. She compares this song to Child 105. See also Barry's text, Tbe Love Token, in JAFL, XXIV, 339 and check Owens, SW Sings, n. p., A Pretty Fair Maid where the returning lover is a cowboy.
106. THE FAMOUS FLOWER OF SERVINGMEN
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids 'Me, 227 / Blackbird Songster (Cozzans, N.Y., c. 1845). Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: A noble girl marries a knight who builds her a home. The place is attacked by robbers (sent by the stepmother); the knight, slain; the others, routed. The girl escapes, dresses herself as a man, and goes to the King's court where she becomes a chamberlain. One day, when the King is out hunting, she takes a harp and sings her own true story to an old man. He later tells the tale to the King, who then marries the girl and rewards the old man.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: Child's text, without the stepmother, is based on English seventeenth century broadsides. The American texts follow the Percy text, Child, II, 429 (headnote), more closely. In this song the spite of the step-mother is mentioned.
110. THE KNIGHT AND THE SHEPHERD'S DAUGHTER
Texts: Brown Coll / BFSSNE, IX, // Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs New f did, 35 / JAFL, XXII, 377 / Miixish Mss.
Local titles: Sweet Willie, The Knight and the Shepherd's Daughter.
Story Types: A: A knight gets drunk and seduces a country girl. She asks his name so that she can call her baby after him. He replies that it is William, of the court, and rides away. She follows on foot. When she reaches the court, she tells the King her story, and he replies that if the man is married he shall hang; if single, shall be married to her. William is called down and
bewails the revelry that has caused him to be forced into a marriage that is below him. Nevertheless, the ceremony is performed. The girl turns out to be a duke's daughter; William, a blacksmith's son.
Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield.
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, but the bribe is retained; that is, the knight offers the girl 500 to maintain her child, if she will forget the marriage.
Examples: HFSSNE, IX, 7.
Discussion: The Newfoundland version (Type A) is close to the usual Child story, although the seduction is nearer rape as in Child E, the attempts to buy off the girl are left out, and the end is made even more dramatic in the knight's being a blacksmith's (Child K), not at least a squire's, son. The Minish Mss. text is generally similar to the other Type A versions, although the knight is now a soldier, some of the details such as the reason for requesting the man's name, the King's decree for the married and single man, etc. are left out. In this text, the girl also indicates that she has a local suitor, and, while her rank is revealed to be that of a princess in the end, her lover's rank does not change.
Type B retains the bribe, and in the text cited above the revelation of the girl's being a princess comes in direct contradiction of the opening line's "shepherd's daughter".
112. THE BAFFLED KNIGHT
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 454 (trace) / BFSSNJS, XII, 12 / Green Mountain Songster, 51. Local Titles: The Shepherd's Son.
Story Types: A: A man out walking meets a pretty girl and asks her where she is going. She smiles and flees. He chases and catches her with the remark "pretty maid, now let us understand".
Examples: SFSSNE, XII, 12.
B: The shepherd's son discovers a girl swimming in a brook, and, although he says he will not take her clothes, he swears to have his will of her. They mount horses and come to a meadow where he decides to have her. She asks him to wait till they get home, however, as the dew will ruin her gown. He consents. But, once home, she slips through the gates, locks him out, and mocks him. He threatens her, but leaves.
Examples: Green Mountain Songster.
Discussion: Type A has the "blow ye winds" chorus of Child Db (See also IV, 495) and follows the tradition of JFSS, II, 18 and W. B. Whall, Sea Sgs & Chanties, 24. The Green Mountain Songster text is close to Child D for the first four stanzas and to IV, 495 in the first stanza, but then it varies from the Child texts, although at many points a similarity to Child E can be seen. The
parting threat of the knight is not in Child, however.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 455 states that a similar story was well-known in Maine under the title, Katie Morey. This song is printed in Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 131 from Pennsylvania as Kitty Maury; in SharpC, Eng F-S So Applchns, 211 from Tennessee and North Carolina as Katie Morey; in Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 64 from Ohio as The Shrewd Maiden; and in Perry, Carter Cnty, 122 from Tennessee as Katy Morley. However, these versions and others like them are secondary at best.
114. JOHNIE COCK
Texts: Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 385 / Fa FLS Bull, #8.
Local Titles: Johnny Cock.
Story Types: A: Johnny, against his mother's warnings, goes out to poach deer. He kills an animal and feasts himself and his dogs so freely that they all fall asleep. Foresters hear him blow his horn, and an old man directs them to the poacher. They attack Johnny. He kills six of them and throws the seventh, badly wounded, over a horse that he may carry the news of the
fight home. Johnny then sends a bird to Fair Eleanor asking that he be fetched back as he is wounded.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: The American version is shorter than the Child texts, though similar to them. Minor American variations are the blast of the horn, Johnie's comments on the forester's attack, the manner in which the seventh forester is sent off, and the flight of the bird to Eleanor rather than to the mother. This text most resembles Child A or B with some traits of D and M, but it has a final stanza that seems to be the result of contact with Lord Thomas and Fair Annet. See Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 385 for a discussion of this and other points in connection with the song. He notes there that the text is incomplete and spotty, although the continuity has remained intact.
118. ROBIN HOOD AND GUY OF GISBORNE
Texts: Brown Coll.
Local Titles: Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne.
Story Types: A: A distorted text tells how Robin Hood lived in the forest killed men and deer, and frightened people. One day a stranger speaks to this outlaw, saying that he is searching for one Robin Hood. As they travel together, Robin Hood reveals himself and then slays the stranger.
Examples: Brown Coll.
Discussion: The story given in this American ballad tells only a small fragment of the original tale. Robin Hood, having dreamed that two yeomen beat and bound him, sets out with Little John for revenge. In the greenwood they encounter a yeoman. John wishes to ask the stranger his intentions, but Robin, thinking this too bold, objects so roughly that John is hurt and goes home. At home, John finds Robin's men pressed by the sheriff, and he is captured and tied to a tree when his bow breaks. Meanwhile, Robin learns from the yeoman that he is seeking Robin Hood, but has lost his way. Robin offers to be his guide, and they go off. A shooting match is proposed, and, when Robin excels, the stranger in admiration wishes to learn his name. They identify themselves as Guy of Gisborne and Robin Hood, and a fight ensues. After scumbling and being hit, Robin lolls Guy with the aid of the Virgin. He then nicks Guy's face beyond recognition, switches clothes, and blows Guy's horn. The sheriff hears in the sound tidings that Guy has slain Robin and believes it is Guy he sees approaching. Robin, as Guy, refuses a reward, but frees John. The sheriff then takes flight, but is slain by an arrow which John sends from Guy's bow.
The North Carolina text is meterically poor and almost prose in spots. Belden in his editing of the Brown Collection notes that the state of the text is likely "due to imperfect recollection on the part of the reporter".
120. ROBIN HOOD'S DEATH
Texts: Davis, Trd Bid Va, 388 / Va FLS SuU, #2.
Local Tides: The Death of Robin Hood.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood complains to Little John that he can no longer shoot well and says he wishes to go to a cousin to be let blood. Robin sets out alone to Kirkely nunnery and 1 is received cordially. His cousin opens a vein, locks him in a room, and lets him bleed till noon the next day. Robin is too weak to escape by a casement. He blows his horn three times, and the notes are so weak that John, on hearing them, concludes his master must be near death. He thus goes to Kirkely, breaks in, and gets to Robin. Little John wants to set fire to the hall, but Robin, who has never harmed a woman, refuses to let him. Robin asks for a bow to shoot his last shot which shall mark his grave, a grave with green grass, a bow at his side, and a tablet stating that Robin Hood lies there.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: This Virginia version follows Child B as to story, but shows definite traces of the professional ballad writer. In fact, this text seems to represent a corrupt broadside version that has slipped back into oral tradition.
The song, obviously incomplete in America, lacks the "blood-letting" stanzas, although it does contain the attempt to ally Robin Hood with Robert, Earl of Huntingdon (see Child Bb) at the end. There is no refrain to the Virginia version.
See Davis, 3rd Bid Va, 388 for a detailed discussion of this text.
125. ROBIN HOOD AND LITTLE JOHN
Texts: American Speech, II, #2 / JAFL, XXIII, 432; XXVII, 57 / SFLQ, II, 72; IV, 15.
Local Titles: Robin Hood and Little John.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood meets Little John on a narrow bridge over a river; neither will give way to let the other pass. When Robin threatens John, the latter calls him a coward as Robin has a bow and John only a staff. Robin then cuts himself a staff, and they fight. After an exchange of blows, Robin is knocked in the water. He pulls himself out and summons his men with a bugle blast. The men are going to duck Little John and pluck out his eyes, but Robin deters them and asks John to join the band. All have a feast.
Examples: American Speech, II; SFLQ, II, 72.
Discussion: American texts are rare and the few that do exist show the influence of print. The Nebraska version is from Kentucky and the Illinois text from Virginia which points to a southern origin for the song.
For a detailed analysis of the effects of transmission on Robin Hood and Little John see E. C. Kirkland, SFLQ, IV, 15 21. He compares a Tennessee- Ohio version line by line with Child 125 A to demonstrate the improvements oral tradition has made in the ballad with respect to narrative effect and diction. H. S. V. Jones (J4FL, XXIII, 432) compares the Virginia-Illinois
version with Child 125, also.
126. ROBIN HOOD AND THE TANNER
Texts: Davis, Trd Sid Va^ 393 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 39 / Va FLS
Local Titles: Robin Hood and Arthur 0' Bland*
Story Types: A: Robin Hood goes to the forest where Arthur O'Bland, the forester, stops him. A two-hour fight ensues. Finally, Robin cries hold and asks the forester's name. (From Child we must supply the missing portion which concerns the learning of the name, the invitation extended to Arthur to join the outlaws and get some fee, and Arthur's acceptance.) Arthur then asks after his kinsman, Little John. Robin blows his horn, and in comes Little John, who wants to wrestle Arthur until all is explained. John then embraces his kinsman, and all three dance about the oak.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: Consult Davis, Trd Bid Va> 393 for a full treatment of the Virginia text. Except for an obviously corrupt first stanza, the Virginia version is quite similar to the Child analogue. It is, however, more compact, having twenty-four, rather than thirty-seven, stanzas.
In Child, Robin Hood is the forester and stays Arthur; a direct reversal has occurred in America.
129. ROBIN HOOD AND THE PRINCE OF ARAGON
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 233.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood, Will Scarlet, and Little John in the wood meet a girl who says a princess must marry the Prince of Aragon (Oregon) unless she and two other girls can find three champions to battle the Prince and his two serpent-crowned giants. The three adventurers plan to accept the challenge, and, when they do, the Prince is greatly annoyed. The villains are slain, and Will finds his long lost father. He also wins the princess who chooses him over the two other champions.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: The Maine version is obviously from print and is a pretty poor specimen. The story, although more compact than Child, III, 147, is the same story.
132. THE BOLD PEDDLER AND ROBIN HOOD
Texts: American Songster (Cozzens, N.Y.), 207 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 457 (trace) / BFSSNE, IX, 8 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, iz / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 217.
Local Titles: Bold Robing Hood, Pedlar Bold.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood and Little John encounter a peddler, and Little John tries to force the man to share his pack with them. The peddler puts his pack on the ground and says that if Little John can move him from it he can have the whole thing. They fight, and John is forced to cry hold. Robin then tries and is also forced to quit. They ask the peddler his name, but he refuses to tell them until they name themselves. They do and learn that the peddler is Gamble Gold, Young Gamwell, etc., a cousin of Robin Hood. They all go and make merry over a bottle in a near-by tavern and dance around the oak.
Examples: Creighton.
Discussion: The Nova Scotia text follows the Child story closely. The Vermont text is sharply abbreviated, and Robin Hood is not in the story. Nevertheless, the outline of the original tale can still be seen, although Little John seems to recognize without help that Will Gammel Gay is his cousin who was banished from America with him. Barry's confidence (Brit Slds Me, 459) that this song and possibly Child 128 would turn up in Maine was justified in part. See BFSSNE, IX, 8.
Child 132, which is a traditional variation of Child 128, can be traced back to the Tale of Gamelyn. Note the names Young Gamwell, Gamble Gold, Gammel Gay, etc. For a brief discussion of the relation of American texts of Child 132 to Child 128 and to broadside songs see JBFSSNE, IX, 8.
135. ROBIN HOOD AND THE SHEPHERD
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 461 states that a Maine woman had heard this song in Ireland in her childhood.
139. ROBIN HOOD'S PROGRESS TO NOTTINGHAM
Texts: Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 15.
Local Titles: Robin Hood.
Story Types: A: A brief song tells how Robin Hood kills fourteen or fifteen foresters with one arrow, routs ten men who come to capture him, and escapes to the greenwood.
Examples: Creighton.
Discussion: The story (see Child, III, 175) in full tells how Robin Hood when fifteen years old fell in with fifteen foresters who were drinking at Nottingham. He made a bet he could kill a deer at one hundred yards. However, when he did it, the men refused to pay. Robin Hood, therefore, killed them all, as well as the men who were sent from Nottingham to capture him. The
story is from the Sloane Ms. 715, 7, fol. 157 and was made into a popular ballad in the seventeenth century. The Canadian fragment is close to Child 139, stanzas 12, 16, and 17.
140. ROBIN HOOD RESCUING THREE SQUIRES
Texts; American Songster (Cozzens, N.Y.), 204 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 240 / Brown Coll.
Local Titles: Robin Hood.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood meets a young lady who, weeping, tells him that three squires of Nottingham have been taken prisoner. Robin calls his men for council and sets out for the town. En route, he meets a beggar. He changes clothes with the man for fifty guineas. Robin then meets the sheriff and tells the officer that he would like to hang the three squires personally
and to give three blasts on his horn "that their souls in heaven might be". The request is granted. Robin mounts the scaffold and gives the three blasts, which serve as a signal to his men. They come, and the sheriff gives over the three squires.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: The Maine version follows Child C, although the lady is not the mother of the three squires. Thus, the hanging of the sheriff on his own gallows, a feature of Child B, is not included.
See the American Songster for a different text which Barry, Brit Bids Me, 242 notes comes from either a poor stall copy or an oral source.
141. ROBIN HOOD RESCUING WILL STUTLY
Texts: Davis, Trd Sid Fa, 397 / Musical Quarterly, II, 4 / 7a FLS Bull, #2.
Local Titles: The Rescue of Will Study.
Story Types: A: Robin Hood learns that Will Stutly has been captured and is to be hung the next day. Robin Hood and his men go to the rescue and have news of the capture confirmed by a palmer standing under the wall of the castle in which Will is confined. Stutly is brought out, and Little John asks the sheriff for permission to speak to Will. He is curtly refused. Then Little John cuts Will's bonds and gives him a sword stolen from one of the sheriffs men. Robin Hood puts the sheriff to flight with an arrow, and Will rejoices.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: The Virginia version has been abbreviated to twenty-one stanzas from the thirty-eight in Child, but is, nevertheless, very close to the Child text. There is one notable difference, however. In the latter Stutly, not Little John, 'addresses the sheriff, and he asks for a sword that he may die fighting rather than, having to be subjected to hanging. Refused, he asks only to have his hands freed. Again he is refused. Little John then frees him.
The American and British texts of the ballad are obviously from print, and the story itself is an imitation of Child 140 in many respects. Davis, Ird Bid Va, 397 prints a detailed stanza comparison of his text with Child's.
143. ROBIN HOOD AND THE BISHOP
See Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N. S., VII, 7398.
155. SIR HUGH OR THE JEW'S DAUGHTER
Texts: Altoona tribune, 11 16 '31, 6 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 461 (trace) / Belden, Mo' F-S, 69 / Berea Quarterly, XVIII, 12 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 128 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, V, 6 / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 76 / Child, III, 248, 251 / Cos, F-S South, 120 / Creighton, Sgs Bids NSc, 16 /Davis, Trd Bid Va, 400 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 66 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 254 / Focus, III, 396, 399 / Grapurcbat, Ea. Radford (Va.) State Teacher's College, 25 '32 / Henry, Beech MtF-S, 22 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 102 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 1 16 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, # 1 7 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, XV, 1 95 ; XIX, 293 ; XXIX, 1 64 j
XXXV, 344; XXXIX, 108, 212; XLI, 470; XLIV, 65, 2965 XLVII, 358; XLVIII, 2975 LII, 43 / Leach-Beck Mss. / Morris, F-S Fla, 450 / Musical Quarterly, II, 124 / Newell, Games Sgs Am Children, 75 / New York Tribune, 727 and 8 4 '22 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 13 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 148 / Scarborough, On Trail N F-S, 53 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 171 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns, #26 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 222 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 148 / SFLQ, VIII, 154 / University of Va. Mgz, Dec. 1912, 115 / Pa FLS Butt, 4s 2 "5 } 7 3 9 n- Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 36.
Local Titles: A Little Boy Lost His Ball, A Little Boy Threw His Ball (Boss) So High, Fair Scotland, Hugh of Lincoln, It Rained a Mist, Little Harry Hughes, Little Sir Hugh, Sir Hugh (of Lincoln), The Jeweler's Daughter, The Jew's Daughter, The Jew's Garden, The Jew's Lady, The Two Playmates.
Story Types: A: Some little boys are playing ball, usually in the rain. One tosses tie ball into the Jew's garden where no one dares go. However, the Jew's daughter invites the scared boy in. After enticing him to accept her invitation with a red apple, cherry, etc., she takes him to a remote part of the house. There she sticks him with pins, stabs him like a sheep, etc. Sometimes, he sees his nurse inside the house picking a chicken, but she pays no attention to his plight. In some endings the "the Bible-at-the-head and prayer book-at-the-feet" motif appears, and the boy requests that his mother be told he is asleep and his playmates be told that he is dead. In certain texts, the body is thrown in a well.
Examples: Belden (A), Cox (A), Davis (A).
B: The story is similar to that of Type A. However, the mother sets out to find her missing boy in the end of these ballads. She locates his body in the well, talks to him miraculously, and sometimes has his body even more miraculously returned to her.
Examples: Child (G, N); JAFL, LII, 43; SharpK (B, F).
C: The story is similar to that of Type A. However, the dialogue between the Jew's daughter and the boy is left out, and the youth volunteers to climb the wall. There is no woman, only "they".
Discussion: This ballad is founded on an incident that may have occurred in 1255. Child, III, 235 states the story as told in the Annals of Waverly in this manner:
A boy in Lincoln, named Hugh, was crucified by the Jews in contempt of Christ, with various preliminary tortures. To conceal the act from the Christians, the body, when taken from the cross, was thrown into a running stream; but the water would not endure the wrong done its maker, and immediately ejected it upon dry land. The body was then buried in the earth, but was found above dry ground the next day. The guilty parties were now very much frightened and quite at their wit's end; as a last resort they threw the corpse into a drinking well. The body was seen floating on the water, and, upon its being drawn up, the hands and feet were found to be pierced, the head had, as it were, a crown of bloody points, and there were various other
wounds : from all which it was plain that this was the work of the abominable Jews. A blind woman, touching the bier on which the blessed martyr's corpse was carrying to the church, received her sight, and many other miracles followed. Eighteen Jews,
convicted of the crime, and confessing it with their own mouth, were hanged.
Further references to Matthew Paris and The Annals of Burton are given by Child on pp. 235 and 237.
The concept of Our Lady, used by Chaucer in The Prioress's Tale, has vanished in America. Our Lady's drawwell is just a well, the mother is just a sorrowing mother, and the religious note is almost forgotten. See SFLQ 9 VIII, 154 (Fla.) where the girl is a jeweler's daughter. Walter M. Hart, English Popular Ballad, 30 I compares Chaucer and the ballad as representatives of the artistic and folk forms of one story. Summers, The History of Witchcraft and Demonology, 195 relates the legend with black
magic.
The American Story Types A and B follow the Child groups K-0 and A-F respectively, while Type C is a degeneration. Reference should be made to Foster Gresham (JAFL, XLVI, 385 f f .) for a discussion of textual variation in action. He uses two versions of Child 155, one taken from a little girl and the other taken from her grandmother who taught the song to her.
Brewster (Sid Sgs Ind) 's A version tells of a "duke's daughter" and a "mother's maid" (nurse) in the house, while his C version makes the day sunny. Note also the "king's daughter" of Randolph, Oz F-S, B and the "gypsy" of Henry, F-S So Hgblds, B. In SharpK, Eng F-S Aplckns, D and E the Jewess calls Hugh her little son, which is baffling. The Jew is a man in Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, 7. And the Bahaman version, printed by Parsons, JAFL, XLI, 470, is corrupted and confused even to the extent of having the boy promise to marry Barbary Ellen when he grows up. The real story has vanished.
Hudson, F-S Miss, 116 notes that his version (with the bloody stanzas omitted) has been used as a lullaby to sing children to sleep. Newell, Games and Sgs Am Children, 75 prints a New York (from Ireland) version which, has become a child's game. See Child N for the same text.
156. QUEEN ELEANOR'S CONFESSION
Linscott, F-S OldNE, 193 prints a song, Fair Rosamond, which is related to the story matter of Child 156. It derives from the broadside, Rosamond's Overthrow.
In a letter. Dr. H. M. Belden informs me that "Queen Eleanors Concession is not now in the collection (F. C. Brown Collection) but it seems clear Brown found it there (in North Carolina) but failed to take down the text." Barry, Brit Bids Me, 462 reports the meeting of a Maine woman who recognized the story.
157. GUDE WALLACE
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 465 found a sea-captain in Maine who recognized the story.
162. THE HUNTING OF THE CHEVIOT OR CHEVY CHASE
'Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 243 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 416 / Ford, Broadsides, Bids, etc. Mass, #s 301113 / Harvard University Library Broadside #25242.53 (312) / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 15.
Local titles: The Battle of Chevy Chase. The Battle of Shiver Chase.
Story Types: A: Percy kills some deer in Scotland, and Douglas, objecting, says he will prevent future foraging. Subsequently, after a feast on slain deer, Percy and his men are attacked by Douglas and his clan. The two leaders are going to fight, but a squire steps forth and announces that he will not stand by while his earl fights. Eventually, however, Douglas and
Percy do battle alone. Percy weakens, and Douglas asks him to surrender. When the Englishman refuses he is slain. An arrow from an English bow then kills Douglas, and a general fight follows. Individual deeds and men are described and named.
Examples: Barry, Davis.
B: A fragment tells in two stanzas of a brutal fight between two earls.
Examples: Mason.
Discussion: The Virginia and Maine texts, both incomplete, follow Child B rather than Child A. However, the fighting has been abbreviated in Virginia, and the order of the deaths changed. See Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 416 and Barry, Brit Bid Me, 247 for summaries and stanza comparisons.
The Chevy Chase tune was popular in the Revolution (see The Cow Chase). For a Revolutionary War anecdote concerning the song, see Barry, op. tit., 248 quoted from William Gordon, History of the Rise. . . of the Independence of the United States of America, London, 1788, I, 481.
164. KING HENRY THE FIFTH'S CONQUEST OF FRANCE
'Texts: BFSSNE, II, 5; IV, 10 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Vt, 36 / Flanders, New On Mt Sgstr, 193 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 108 / JAFL, XLV, 17 / N.J. Journal of Educ, XX, #s 3-4, 6-7 / PMLA, XLVIII, 307.
Local Titles: King Henry the Fifth's Conquest of France.
Story Types: A: King Henry decides to collect a tribute from the King of France. He sends a page abroad, and the messenger brings back some tennis balls as the French monarch's reply. Henry then musters an army of men, none married, none sons of widows. He attacks France, and, after withstanding the first onslaught, triumphs. With a bribe of the French princess and a large amount of gold he returns to England.
Examples: Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr; Henry, F-S So HgHds.
Discussion: The American stories differ little from Child or from each other. The ballad is extremely rare in this country, although the discovered texts have been frequently reprinted.
For an analysis of the relation of this ballad to the Alexander romance see Child, III, 322 and Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 195. The parallel between Alexander's insult from Darius and his marriage to Roxanna to the events in the ballad is stressed. The balls and the references to the eventual victor's tender years are in both stories.
166. THE ROSE OF ENGLAND
See Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N* S., VII, 73 98.
167. SIR ANDREW BARTON (including 250, HENRY MARTYN)
Texts: Adventure, n 30 '23 ; 1 120 '24 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 248 / Belden, Mo F-S, 27 / Child, IV, 395 ; V, 302 / Cox, F-S Soutb, 150 / Davis, FS Fa / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 78 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Vt, 8 / Focus, V, 280 / Qardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 211 / Gray, Sgs Bids Me Vjks, 80 / Haufrecht (ed.), Way\ariri Stranger, 20 / JAFL, XVTtll, 135, 302; XXV, 171; XXX, 327 / Karpeles, F-S Netofdld, 104. / Kolb, Treasry F-S, 19 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 61 / Randolph, Oz F-S, 1, 177; Reed Smith, SC Bids, 156; SFLQ, II, 205 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtcbs, 37.
Local Titles: Andrew Bardeen (Satan, Battan), Andrew Martine, Andy (Ander) Barden (Bratann), Bolender Martin, Elder Bardee, The Pirates, The Three Scotch Brothers, Three Brothers of (Merrie) Scotland.
Story Types; A: Three Scottish brothers cast lots to see which of them shall become a pirate to support the family. The lot falls to the youngest, Andy. He attacks and robs a rich English merchant. When the King learns of this crime, he sends Captain Stewart (Howard, in England) out to catch the robbers. Stewart locates and takes Andy, and brings him back to the gallows in England. Sometimes, however, Andy is sunk and drowned instead.
Examples: Barry (under 167) (B); Belden; SFLQ, II, 205.
B : The story is the same as that of Type A. However, Andy beats Stewart in the fight and continues on his way.
Examples: Barry (under 167) (A); Cox; Randolph.
C: The Barry (Brit Bids Me, 253 ff.) "Henry Martyn" type story ends with the capture of the merchant ship and the bad news* reaching England. In some versions the hero receives a death-wound and dies.
Examples: Eddy (A); Haufrecht; JAFL, XVIII, 135.
Discussion: This ballad and Henry Martyn (Child 250) are closely allied (see Child, IV, 393), and Barry, Brit Bids Me, 253ff., argues that they are the same song. He bases his claim on the older American texts and points out that the Child Henry Martyn stories are all fragments of the Andrew Barton tale which leave the chase and the capture out. Any ballad that has
a chase and capture is Sir Andrew Barton. The American Henry Martyn songs that have the hero die and fall overboard are the result of a crossing with a text of Sir Andrew Barton itself or of an accident of traditional change. His conclusion is that Sir Andrew Barton exists in two forms in America: the story in which Sir Andrew Barton is hung (Type A), and the story in which, through contact with Captain Ward and the Rainbow (Child 287), Sir Andrew Barton wins and escapes (Type B). There are also abbreviations of these types which do not contain the chase and the capture. Such songs should be properly considered as Henry Martyn versions of Sir Andrew Barton. Barry is probably right. See Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 8 1 for further discussion.
Barry, ibid. 9 also poses an interesting and probably accurate hypothesis that the Charles Stewart (Stuart) who replaces Howard in the ballad is Captain Charles Stewart (17781869), U. S. N.
Henry Martyn was a popular stall ballad in the nineteenth century (see Kittredge's note in JAFL> XXX, 327), but there is no record of Sir Andrew Barton being printed in America.
Note also that the West Virginia version is almost identical to Child, V, 302 (South Carolina).
170. THE DEATH OF QUEEN JANE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me^ 466 (trace) / BFSSNE, II, 6 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 419 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 219 / Niles, Anglo-Am Bid Stdy Bk> 24 / Niles, Bids Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds, 16 / Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 254 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 230.
Local Titles: The Death of Queen Jane.
Story Types: A: Queen Jane is in labor for more than six weeks. She tells the doctors to cut her open and save the baby. However, King Henry refuses to sacrifice her for the child. She dies, and the baby is saved, regardless. The funeral takes place, and the baby is christened.
Examples: Niles, Bids Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds; SharpK (A, B).
B : The story is similar to that of Type A. However, Queen Jane has become "a neighbor", and she calls for her father and mother before she calls for King Henry. Examples: BFSSNE, II, 6.
C: A lyric on the theme of Queen Jane's labor survives from the ballad and contains repeated comments by her mother, her father, and Prince Henry that "the Red Rose of England shall flourish no more".
Examples: Scarborough.
D : Sally is taken sick and goes to bed. King Henry is sent for. Then the "Are you the doctor ?" lines from the American Brown Girl (Child 295) enters (see Child lyoB), as does the gloating over the dying girl by the jilted lover. Sally's presentation of the ring and her death follow. Examples: Davis, p. 420; SharpK, p. 303.
Discussion: The full ballad is a threnody on the death of Jane Seymour, who succumbed twelve days after the birth of Prince Edward, October 12, 1537. The Queen is ill, begs for surgery to save her unborn (in the ballad) child. See Child, III, 3723. King Henry refuses to sacrifice the mother for the child. An operation becomes necessary, and the boy lives through it, while the mother dies. The jubilation over the birth is lost in lamentation.
The Type A version follows this story rather closely. Type B is probably from a broadside (see BFSSNE, II, 7) and shows a variation from "in labor" to "a neighbor" that might eventually change the details of the story. The refrain has become "the red roads of England shall flourish no more". It should also be noted that Henry does not enter the song until the eighth of ten stanzas. If a singer were to forget the last three stanzas a new story would exist. For a comparison of this version to Child A, E, H, and I see BFSSNE, II, 7.
The Type C text is rather beautiful, but it needs little explanation. It is the result of a common American ballad tendency. The Type D stories, however, reveal the growth of a new ballad from the merger of two older ones. The entrance of the doctor into a dying woman's room has been sufficient to switch the story into the American Brown Girl and to change the Queen's name to Sally, although the "black and yellow" funeral stanzas are retained at the end. The result appears to be a counterpart of Barbara Allen with the sexes reversed. See Davis, Trd Bid Va 419.
Flanders, FtF-S lds, 219 prints a song called Two Dukes which contains the first two lines of Stanza 5 and the last two lines of Stanza 6 (the funeral description) of Child 1700. It is given as a version of The Death of Queen Jane, but it seems to me to be The Duke of Bedford which has been corrupted by Child 170. See also BFSSNE, II, 7.
173. MARY HAMILTON
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 258 / BFSSNE, III, 8 / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 141 / Davis, Trd Sid Va, 4.2,1 / Franklin Square Song Collection (J. P. McCaskey), VI, 75 / no Scotch Songs, Thomas a Becket, Jr. (Ditson, Boston) / Randolph, OzF-S, 1, 151 / Smith and Rufty, Am Antb Old WrU Bids, 42.
Local litles: Mary Hamilton, The Four Marys.
Story Types: A: Mary Hamilton, one of Queen Mary of Scotland's four servants named Marie, is with child by a member of- the court. She throws the baby in the sea when it is born, but Queen Mary suspects and discovers the truth. Mary Hamilton is condemned to burn at the stake or hang. After telling the people not to weep for her and drinking a toast or two, Mary Hamilton rues the outcome of her life before she dies.
Examples: Combs.
B: A lyric lament at the stake or gallows, with almost no trace of the story, has been found.
Examples : Barry (A), Davis (A).
Discussion: The Type A text from West Virginia is close to Child A. The lyric laments (Type B) come from the end of the ballad where Mary makes her last piteous remarks before the execution. They resemble Child BB. The events narrated in the ballad may be based on either the story of an incident in the court of Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1563 in which a French woman servant and the Queen's apothecary were concerned or the affair in Czar Peter of Russia's court in 1718 19 involving one Mary Hamilton and an officer named Orloff, or both. See Child, III, sSoff., and Tolman, PMLA, XLII, 422.
176. NORTHUMBERLAND BETRAYED BY DOUGLAS
See Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N. S., VII, 73 98.
178. CAPTAIN CAR or EDOM GORDON
Reed Smith lists this ballad as one of the Child survivals in America. See SFLQ, I, $2, 9 II. I have not been able to locate a published text, however.
180. KING JAMES AND BROWN
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 467 reports that a Maine sea-captain recognized the ballad.
181. THE BONNY EARL OF MURRAY
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 468 (trace) / Brown Coll / JAFL, XX, 158; XLIV, 297.
Local Titles: Highlands and Lowlands.
Story Types: A: One text is an almost lyric moan for the Earl of Murray
who has been slain and laid on the green. It was ordered he be captured, not
killed. He was a. capable man, a favorite of the Queen, and might have be-
come King. Examples: JAFL, XLIV, 297.
B : A similar lyric, which mourns Murray, upbraids Huntly for killing the man in his bed, reminds him his wife will rue the deed, and tells him he will not dare come into Dinnybristle town for a long time.
Examples: JAFL, XX, 158.
Discussion: The Type A story follows Child A closely, while Type B is an incomplete variation which resembles Child B (Stanzas 6 and 9) in its final two stanzas. In Type B the speakers and the story background are not clear. For the complete story behind the ballad and for the details of the murder of Murray by Huntly in February 1592 see Child, III, 447.
Barry found a Maine sea-captain who recognized the song. See Barry, Brit Bids Me, 468.
183. WILLIE MACINTOSH
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 264.
Local Titles: None given.
Story lypes: A: Willie Macintosh, involved in a border feud, is burning
Auchendown, although he has been warned that Huntly is moving to head
him off. Examples : Barry.
Discussion: Barry, Brit BUs Me, text follows Child A closely. However,
the ballad was taken down from recitation and appears to be no longer sung
in Maine. See Barry, op. cit. 9 265.
The ballad is based on one of a series of revenge incidents which originated in the Murray murder (see Child 181) of 1592. William Macintosh and his men were attacked and routed by Huntly while ravaging the latter's lands. See Child, III, 465 for the complete details of the events and an explanation of the confusion of two William Macintoshes.
185. DICK THE COW
In Focus (Farmville, Va.), V, 297, Reed Smith notes that this ballad "had been found in Missouri. Johnnie Armstrong steals Dick's three cows. Dick retaliates gloriously". I have not seen a text.
187. JOCK O THE SIDE
Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 238 prints a story outline of this ballad as it was recited in Pennsylvania with a few stanzas recalled. The stanzas compare to Child B, Stanzas I, 11, 12 14, 26 28. The long story is summarized by Child, III, 4767. The plot (Child B) revolves about the rescue of Jock from Newcastle by a handful of men who climb the town wall, enter the jail, kill the porter, and escape, with Jock still in irons, by swimming the Tyne just
ahead of the pursuing English.
188. ARCHIE CAWFIELD
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 393 / BFSSNE, VI, 7 / Child, III, 494 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 217 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 172,
Local Titles: Bold Dickie.
Story Types: A: Two brothers bewail a third brother who is in prison. They muster forty men and, under the leadership of one brother, Dickie (Hall), cross a river and break into the jail. The inmate, Archer, is chained and pessimistic, but Dickie frees him. They ride to the river, where Archer loses courage because his horse is lame and cannot swim. However, the mount is changed, and he gets over. The sheriff then appears with one hundred men, and when Archer sees them in pursuit his courage wavers again. Dickie, however, just mocks his pursuers.
Examples: Child F, Linscott.
Discussion: The ballad resembles Jock o the Side (Child 187) quite closely, more so in Child A-E than in the American Child F. For a complete treatment of the English stories in comparison with F see Child, III, 484ff. See also the fragment, similar to Child F, in BFSSNE, VI, 7.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 393 ff. prints four Massachusetts and one Maine derivatives of Archie o Cawfield which probably reveal the Child ballad adapted to the imprisonment of a Massachusetts mint-master, John Webb, by the Government in 1800. Webb was freed by friends. Barry states that these fragments, if placed together, "would very nearly complete the ballad" and suggests a comparison to Child F, although resemblances to Child A and B are noted. The titles John Weller and Billy and Johnny are used.
Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, print a long secondary version which was collected in Michigan and which they feel follows Child B.
199. THE BONNIE HOUSE O AIRLIE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 266 / Cox, F-S Sottth, 128 / English Journal (April 1918), 270. Local Titles: Prince Charlie, The Bonnie Hoose o' Earlie, The Plundering of Arley.
Story Types: A: During the reign of Cromwell, the Duke of Argyle moves to plunder the house of the Earl of Airly. The latter is away. Lady" Margaret Airly sees Argyle approach with his men. When he reaches the gates, she refuses to come down and loss him. He seizes her, however, and eventually discovers her dowry among the planting. Then, he lays her down on the
streamside while he plunders the home. The wife swears if she had seven (eleven) sons, she would give them all to Charles.
Examples: Barry (A), Gardner and Chickering.
B : The story is essentially like that of Type A. However, the lady of the estate is just a girl and the absent protector just a knight. In addition, she requests to be taken to the valley where she cannot see the plundering, but is instead taken to a mountain top and made to watch the destruction. The real story is lost, and the War of the Roses is used as the background.
Examples: Barry (B).
C: The story of Type C is essentially a cross between Types A and B. The heroine is still Lady Margaret, whose husband, the Earl, is absent, but the mood, detail, and story are those of Type B.
Examples: Cox.
Discussion: The historical background of this ballad is summarized by Child, IV, 55 and centers about the 1640 commission issued to the Earl of Argyle by which he was permitted to subdue and bring to "their duty" certain political and religious undesirables. Argyle interpreted his commission rather savagely.
The Type A story follows Child A, while Type B is related to Child BB and Greig, Last Leaves of Trd Bids, B. The West Virginia (Type C) text, which appears to be a cross of Types A and B is closest to Child C.
A comparison should be made of the two unusual stanzas at the start of the Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, fragment and Stanzas 10 and 12 of a Ford broadside (See Ford, Broadsides, Bids, etc. Mass (2nd series),. 167 9). These stanzas begin, in the Gardner and Chickering book, with the line c< What loo* is that, 'quoth the brave Lor' Heel".
An Illinois version, that is said to be "the work of a high school student born in Scotland, but long a resident of this country" is printed in English Journal for April, 1918, p. 270. This text would be a Type D story, if one could be certain that it was not partly composed by the student in question. The story begins like Type A, but after the lady refuses to come down a change occurs in the narrative events. In the next stanza, Airly returns and, finding the carnage, swears revenge. He attacks Argyle's clan (the Campbells), but fails to slay the Lord. His drummer makes light of the fray; so- Airly in a rage throws him from a tower. The boy swears he will haunt his master on the latter's death-day. Later, on hearing drums playing mysteriously from the tower, Airly knows his time has come.
200, THE GYPSY LADDIE
Texts: Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 49 / Arlington's Banjo Songster (Philadelphia, 1860), 47 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 269 / Belden, Mo F-S, 73 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 134 / Brown Coll / CFLO, V, 212 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 59 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 37 / Chase, Trd Bid Sgs Sgng Games, 4 / Child, IV, 72 / Cox, F-S South, 130 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 31 / Cox, W. 7 a. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 428 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 423 / De-Witt's Forget-me-not Songster (N.Y., 1872), 223 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 85 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 67 / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 69 / Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 220 / Garrison,
Searcy Cnty, 10 / Gilbert, Lost Chords, 35 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 38 / Hauri, Cocke Cnty, 65 / Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 6 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 1 10 / Hooley's. Opera House Songster, 46 / Hudson, .F-S Miss, 117 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 26 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, JfrrtlJAFL, XVIII, 191 5 XIX, 294; XXIV, 346;XXV, i73;XXVI } 3 5 3 ;XXX, 323, XLVIII, 385; LII, 79 / Karpeles, F-S Newfdld, 13 / Ky Cnties Mss. / Kincaid, Fav Mi Bids, 33 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 207 / Lomax, Am Bids F-S, 292 / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, i$6/ Lunsford and Stringfield, 30 & i F-S So Mts, 4 / Mclntosh, So III F-S, 17 / Martz' Sensational Songster, 6$ / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 21 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 15 / Minish Mss. / MLN, XXVII, 242 / Morris, F-S Fla, 455 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, 8 / Neely and Spargo, Tales Sgs So III, 140 / New York broadside (de Marsan, List 4^3, #28), Brown University Library / Owens, Sttidies Tex F-S, 28 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 86, 298 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, io/ Raine, Land Sddle Bags, 119 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 152 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 311 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 215 / Sharp C, EngF-S So Aplcbns, #27 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 237 / Smith and Rufty, Am Antb Old Wrld Bids, 44 / SFLQ, VIII, 1567 Stout, F-L la, ii / Va FLS Bull, #s 3, 5, 8, 9, n / Harry L. Wilson, Lions of tbe Lord, 37680.
Local Titles: Bill Harman, Black-eyed Davy, Black-jack Davy (David, Daley), Cross-eyed David, Egyptian Davy-O, Gay Little Davy, Georgia Daisy, Gypsea Song, Gypsie (Gypsen, Gypso) Davy, Gypsy Daisy, It was Late in the Night When Johnny Came Home, Oh Come and Go Back My Pretty Fair Miss, Seven Gypsies in a Row, The Dark-clothes Gypsy, The Gypsies, The Gypsy (Gyptian) Laddie, The Gypsy Lover, The Heartless Lady, The Lady's Disgrace, The Three Gypsies, When Carnal First Came to Arkansas, When the Squire Came Home.
Story Types: A: A gypsy sings or whistles before the lord's house and charms his lady away, often after he has received gifts of such things as wine, nutmeg, rings, etc. from her. When the lord returns and finds his wife gone, he orders his horses saddled and overtakes the elopers. He asks his lady if she has forsaken him, her child, and warm bed. Mentioning, in some
texts, that she married against her will in the first place, she assures him she has. Most texts include some of the following material: the husband asks- his wife who will care for the children and receives the reply, "you will"; the husband tells the wife to remove her fine Spanish shoes and give him her hand in farewell; some comments are made on the comparative poverty
of the woman's new station.
Examples: Barry (A); Cox, F-S South (C); Davis (A); JAFL, XVIII, 191 (B); Perry (B).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A, except that the wife writes her husband a few weeks later that she is tired of her lover and wishes to come home. He writes back that he has another girl, and she can stay with her gypsy. Examples: Davis (B).
C: The story is similar to that of Type A, except that the gypsy casts the lady off in the end.
Examples: Belden (C), Garrison.
D: The story is similar to that of Type A. However, in a fashion that is reminiscent of Type B, the lord remarries inside six months.
Examples: Child (J).
E: The story resembles Type A. However, the lady repents and goes home to her "feather bed and baby".
Examples: Cox, F-S South (B).
F: A West Virginia adaption of the ballad to a local event has the husband follow the elopers and give up the chase when he loses their trail. Examples: Cox, F-S South (D),
G: The sexes become reversed in some texts (though in the garbled Scarborough example the original arrangement remains in the opening stanza), and the lady runs off with another girl.
Examples: Scarborough (C); JAFL, XVIII, 194 (F).
H: The versions that have been corrupted by stanzas from the old English folksong "I'm. Seventeen Come Sunday" have the "gypsy" ask the girl her age and get the "seventeen (sixteen ) next Sunday" reply. He may also ask the girl whether or not she will flee with him and again get the "next Sunday" reply. She then removes her low (high) shoes of Spanish leather, puts
on her high (low)-heeled ones, and rides off with her new lover. The normal pursuit of the husband, the usual scorning of him, and the "cold ground- feather bed" comparison follow.
Examples: Hudson, F-S Miss (B); JAFL, XLVIII, 385; III, 79.
I: A short lyric has been found: last night I lay in my feather bed, but tonight in the arms of a gypsy. The story is completely gone, and only the comparison of the two lives remains.
Examples: Flanders, Vt F-S Bids (A).
Discussion: The basic outline of the traditional story (see Child, IV, 61 ff. for detail) is as follows : Some gypsies sing at a lord's gate and entice the lady down. When she shows herself they cast a spell over her, and she gives herself over to the gypsy chief (Johnny Faa from Seanin an Faith or Johnny the Seer in Gaelic. See Linscott, F-S Old NE 9 208.) without reservation. Her
lord, upon returning and finding her gone, sets out to recover her. He captures and hangs fifteen gypsies.
The song is probably the rationalization of a fairy-lover story (The Randolph, Oz F-S, E text has the lady admit she is bewitched. This may, of course, be a modern reversal to the original motif, or it may be a survival of that motif.) that has later become allied with a traditional story of the love affair and subsequent elopement of one Johnny Faa and Lady Cassilis, wife of the Earl of Cassilis. (See Child, IV, 63 ff. where the name Johnny Faa is stated to be a very common one among the nomads and where the story is discussed.)
There are any number of minor variations in this story as told by the American ballads. In this country, the hanging of the gypsies and the names Faa and Cassilis are omitted. The rationalization has frequently been carried further so that the gypsy becomes merely a lover and the lady a landlord's wife, etc. (See Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids. Note also Davis,
Trd Bid Fa, E where the gypsies are on their way to becoming Indians.) For a detailed discussion of one America (Ohio) text see MLN, XXVII, 242-4.
In general, it may be said that American texts follow the Child H and I versions most closely. There are, however, a large number of story types, the differences centering mostly about the final outcome of the tale. Type A tells the usual American narrative, with the rejection of the secure home for the insecure nomad life seeming to appeal to the New World (See Type I)*
The Spanish boots so frequently mentioned are to be found in Child G as well. Types B, C, and D reveal an almost puritanical revision of the end in the interests of seeing justice done or because of local incidents that have attached themselves to the story as Garrison, Searcy Cnty, II suggests. Type E is pure sentimentality, and Type F shows the influence of a local event on the narrative. The West Virginia elopement of Tim Wallace, a very ugly man, with Billy Harman's wife, an exceptionally pretty woman, is retold in the framework of The Gypsy Laddie. Type G is an example of degeneration through transmission in this case to the point of absurdity. (See Flanders, Ft F-S Bids, 220 and Reed Smith, SC Blds 9 37 for discussion.) Type H is the result of a corruption of the ballad by "I'm Seventeen Come Sunday". The amount of transfer varies to some degree within this type, but members of the group are not uncommon. See Haun, Cocke Cnty, 65; JAFL, LII, 79; Mason, Cannon Cnty, 21; and Neely and Spargo, Tales Sgs So III, 140; as well as others.
The jingling American refrains are not in the British texts. See Belden, Mo F-S, 74. Usually some nonsense phrase like "ring a ding", etc. or "diddle dum", etc. constitutes the refrain many times in the form of a chorus. However, meaningful refrains do occur. See "oh how I love thee" in Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 85 (Tennessee). Also, a "raggle-taggle gypsy" line often
recurs. See Cox, Trd Bid W 7 a, C.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 273 expresses the belief that he has found a text of the song of Irish origin.
The ballad has been the subject of a number of burlesques. See particularly DeWitfs Forget-me-not Songster (N. Y., 1872), 223.
201. BESSY BELL AND MARY GRAY
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 278 / Cox, F-S South, 134 / Cox, W. Fa. School Journal and Educator^ 428 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 432 / Mother Goose's Melodies (James Miller, N.Y., 1 869) / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mis, 191.
Local Titles: Bessy (Betsey) Bell and Mary Gray.
Story Types: A: The first four lines of the Child ballad exist as a song by themselves. Examples: Davis (C, D).
B: The first four lines of the Child ballad, with a nursery stanza added, exist as a nonsense rime.
Examples: Barry (A), Davis (A).
C: A two-stanza song is made up of the first stanza used by Types A and B in addition to a stanza on the green, not red or yellow, shoes the girls wore. Examples: Cox, F-S South.
D: The first stanza is that of Type A, The second stanza tells of the death, coming from the town and killing the 1 girls.
Examples: Scarborough.
Discussion: This ballad is based on the old Scottish story concerning two girls, Mary Gray, daughter of a laird of Lednock; and Bessy Bell, daughter of the laird of Kinvaid. When the latter girl was visiting the former in 1645, a plague broke out. The two women sought refuge in a bower. However, before long they were infected by a young man who was in love with one or
both and who brought them food. They were buried near-by. The London Times of July 8, 1832 (and again of July 8, 1932) prints a report of the fencing in of the girls' grave by Lord Lynedoch in order to protect it from sightseers.
Davis, Trd Bid 7a, 432 reports that there are two mountains in County Tyrone in Ireland that have the same names as the girls. These titles have also been given to twin peaks near Staunton, Va. For further details consult Child, IV, 75 --6.
The American texts are fragmentary, but this condition seems to be the rule in the New World. Davis, of. cit., 433 notes that "several people have told me they had known the first stanza of the ballad all their lives, but had no idea it was a ballad". Type A is of this sort. Compare it with Child's text, Stanzas I or 4. See also Ramsay's Poems, Edinburgh, 1721, 80 as quoted by Child, IV, 75. Type E is found as a nursery rime in Halliwell's Nursery Rhymes of England, 1874, 2 4^ an( i * s ^ e most common American type. Type C seems to have been corrupted by The Gypsie Laddie (Child 200), while Type D constitutes an incomplete form of the Child text. See Stanzas I and 2 in Child.
204. JAMIE DOUGLAS
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 469 ff. presents evidence that this song will be found in Maine. He prints a text (0 Waly Waly) which derives from a song that Child, IV, 92 notes has shared stanzas with Jamie Douglas (Child A-M versions). Waly Waly appeared in Ramsay's Tea Table Miscellany, II, under the title Waly Waly Gin Love Be Bonny.
208. LORD DERWENTWATER
Texts: JAFL, XLVII, 95 / Morris, F-S Fla, 460 / SFLQ, VIII, 158. Local Titles: The King's Love Letter.
Story Types: A: The Duke is summoned to England by a "love letter" from the King, He calls his eldest son and tells the lad that he is leaving for London. Before the city, he meets a man who fortells the Duke's death and asks for his will. The will is given; thereupon the Duke's nose begins to bleed as he stoops over to smell flowers. The song is incomplete, and it ends with the Duke's wish that his children be cared for.
Discussion: The story of the incomplete Florida version can be reconstructed from the Child texts (especially Child D) where Derwentwater, who was actually an agitator for the Pretender, is summoned as a Scotsman to the court. His wife, with child, forseeing his death, tells him to make his will before he goes. Derwentwater complies. He then sets forth. En route, by some omen such as a bleeding nose, the stumbling of his horse, etc. he knows his days are numbered. At London, he is branded a traitor. An old man with an axe then steps up (undoubtedly this man is the original of the American questioner) and demands the Lord's life. Derwentwater is slain after a few generous dying requests.
For a discussion of the one American text of the ballad and the folk superstition in the nose-bleeding see SFLQ, VIII, 158. A. C. Morris, the editor of this item, sees this discovery as an indication of the retention of English eighteenth centnry culture in the South.
209. GEORDIE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 475 (trace) / Belden, Mo F-S, 76 / Brown Coll / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 37 / Cox, F-S South, 135 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 435 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 241 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 317 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 40 / Orem Mountain Songster, 33 / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XX, 319; XXXII, 504 / Niles, SgsHillFlk, 12 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, n / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 161 / Randolph, Oz MtFlk, 2Z4/ Scarborough, Sgctchr SoMts, 213 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns, #28 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 240 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 162 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 158 /
SFLO, V, 170 / Va FLS Bull, #s 7, 9 / Wetmore and Bartholomew, Mt Sgs NC, 13.
Local Titles: Charlie and Sally, Charley's Escape, Geordie, Georgia, George E. Wedlock, Georgie, Georgy-O, Go Saddle Up My Milk-White Steed, Johnny Wedlock, Lovely Georgie, The Laird of Gigh, The Life of Georgia.
Story Types: A: A man crossing London Bridge sees a girl weeping for Georgie. Georgie, in prison for a crime calling for capital punishment, has sent for his sweetheart or wife. She has hurried to him and knows that he can be rescued by a large ransom. She raises the money. However, Georgie in denying one capital offense admits another and is sentenced to death. He is hung. The girl often expresses the wish that she were armed so that she might fight for him.
Examples: Belden (A); Davis (A); Randolph, OzF-S (D).
B: The same general story is told in this type. However, in some texts, upon her arrival at the prison the lady is offered aid by an old man. At any rate, the king or judge says she has come too late and that Geordie is already condemned for horse or deer stealing. Geordie is hung in silk robes (or similar suitable style) because he is of royal blood and loved by a virtuous
lady. The wish of the girl that she had weapons with which to fight for her lover is sometimes found in this type too.
Examples: Cox, Greenleaf and Mansfield.
C: The story is the same as that of Type A. However, it is told differently, and the ransom and the girl's pleas are successful so that Charlie and his Sally go free.
Examples: Flanders; Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly.
D: This type of story rises from the traditional British texts in which Geordie is freed by his wife (true love). Geordie is in trouble. He sends a man to tell his lady of his plight. She hurries to the King and produces enough money to free her man.
Examples: Randolph, OzF-S (C); Scarborough.
Discussion: Because of the existence of the Scottish traditional song, Geordie, and two not dissimilar broadsides Georgie Stools (early seventeenth century) and The Life and Death of George of Oxford (late seventeenth or early eighteenth century), this ballad presents a definite scholarly problem. (See Child, IV, 1237, 1402.) The chances are that the two broadsides re-
present literary reworkings and contemporary adaptions of the old Scottish song. (See Cox, F-S South, 135.) However, Ebsworth, Roxburghe Ballads, VII, 67 73 thought the opposite to be the case.
Although the ransom motif is generally vague or lacking and the crime charged may be murder, as well as stealing the king's cattle, the Type A-C American texts derive from George of Oxford and the variant British broadsides. See Child, IV, 124 and 127, and JAFL, XX, 319. In the broadsides, the hero is hung in the end, although the girl's pleas are successful in the traditional texts as well as in the Green Mountain Songster version (Type C). Barry (see a letter quoted by Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 142 ff.) discusses this point in connection with the derivative songs such as the Henry The Judge and the Jury, op. cit., 142.
The Type A-C American texts are difficult to classify. The Type A and Type B stories are certainly from the same broadside tradition, having many stanzas in common. However, in a narrative sense, they do fall into two classes, if only because of the material retained or forgotten in each group. Both these types contain stanzas that have not been traced to either the known broadsides or the traditional texts in Child. Type C, although it shares much material with Types A and B, seems to have an ancestor with a sentimentalized close.
Type D texts are localized variants of the traditional form of the song, even though they seem to have passed unrecognized as such. Randolph, Oz F-S, C parallels Child F rather closely through its first seven stanzas and summarizes the story of Child F in the last four stanzas. Of course, Child F is not a pure example of the traditional form of the song, its first and second stanzas having been corrupted by the Oxford broadside, but it does tell the traditional tale. Randolph's variant has an Oxford first stanza like Child F, but from there on shows no relation to any form but the traditional. However, certain localizations and repetitive features have clouded the identity to some degree. The Scarborough text (See Wetmore and Bartholomew, Mt
Sgs NC, 13 for a very similar text taken from the same informant) is abbreviated, but obviously related to the Randolph song. See SFLQ, XIII, 161-168.
Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 37 prints a fragment called Johnny Wedlock (the Randolph text has the title George E. Wedlock). However, it is too brief to be clearly identified.
210. BONNIE JAMES CAMPBELL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 279 / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 144 / Davis, FS Va / JAFL, XVIII, 294.
Local Titles: Bonnie George Campbell, Bonnie Johnnie Campbell, Willie Campbell.
Story Types: A: The story is lost in Britain as well as in America, so that we only know that Bonnie James Campbell rode out armed one day and that, although his saddled horse came home, he did not. His bride, mother, etc., went out to meet him, but he was never to return. The place was uncared for; his baby unborn.
Examples: Barry (A, B), Combs (A, B).
Discussion; The tale behind this ballad is unknown. Child, IV, 143 cites Motherwell's and Maidment's theories, and Barry, Brit Bids Me, 281 reconstructs the story as it stands in the known fragments.
The American texts are similar to those in Child and show a close relationship with the versions given in Smith's Scotish Minstrel, V, 42. See Barry, op. cit. 9 ^J<)i.i. for a discussion and comparison of the American and British versions, as well as a modification of some of Child's remarks.
213. SIR JAMES THE ROSE
Texts: American Speech, I, 481 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 284 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs NSct 48.
Local Titles: Sir James the Rose, Sir James the Ross.
Story Types: A: The Ross Story: James the Ross learns at a meeting in the woods with his true love Matilda that she must marry the hated John Grames on her father's orders. Donald Grames overhears the conversation between the lovers and, after the girl departs, makes himself known to Ross. Ross kills the eavesdropper. Fearful of revenge by the Grames clan, Ross then sets out to get aid from his kinsman, stopping en route to awaken Matilda and tell her what he has done. She detains him and hides him, saying that a page will rouse his clansmen. The page, however, meets John Grames on the way, tells him what has taken place, and is bribed into revealing James' whereabouts. When the Grames come to Matilda's house, they find
Ross sleeping in the wood much to the dismay of the girl. Ross is able to kill four (or fifteen) of his attackers before John Grames stabs him from behind. Matilda then kills herself, and the page follows suit.
Examples: Am Speech, I, 481; Barry; MacKenzie (A, B).
Discussion: The Child Sir James the Rose ballad is not in America. The American texts are highly sophisticated and based on Sir James the Ross, a song Child, IV, 156 thought to have been composed by Michael Bruce. Barry, Brit Bids M?, 290 i, citing Alexander Keith (editor) in Greig's Last Leaves of Traditional Bids, points out that both the Ross (not in Child's collection) and Rose (which Child printed) ballads are derived from eighteenth century broadsides and stall copies and that Michael Bruce is mistakenly considered the composer of the former. He also points out on Keith's authority that the Ross version has ousted the Rose in Scotland and that his American copy of Ross is identical with the 1768 and oldest known Scottish (150 Scots Songs, London, 1768) text of the story. His version being that old and well established in oral tradition, Barry therefore rates the
Ross texts as a primary, rather than a secondary, form of the story in America. Also see MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 48. MacKenzie's A version is particularly sophisticated. The Pound, American Speech, Nebraska version does not differ materially from the northern texts.
214. THE BRAES OF YARROW
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 291 / Cox, F-S South, 137 / Siegmeister, Sgs Early Am, 4.0.
Local Titles: The Dewy Dens of Yarrow.
Story Types: A: Seven sons, two of them twins, battle for their true love in the dens of Yarrow. The girl dreams she has been gathering pretty heather blooms in Yarrow. Her mother reads her dreams to mean that her Jimmy has been slain. The girl then searches him up and down through Yarrow and finds him dead behind a bush. She washes his face, combs his hair, bathes
the wound, and, wrapping her yellow hair about his waist, pulls him home. She tells her mother to make her death-bed, and, although her mother promises her a better love than the one slain, she dresses in clean white clothes, goes to the river, and lies down to die on the banks.
Examples: Siegmeister.
Discussion: The story in Child is that of a girl who dreams she has been pulling heather on the braes of Yarrow and wishes her true-love not to go to the highlands as she fears her cruel brother will betray him for stealing her from her family (other similar reasons are given in certain texts). Nevertheless, while drinking the night before, he has pledged himself to a fight on
the braes at dawn and sets out in spite of her pleas. At Yarrow, he is attacked by nine of her family and, although killing four and wounding five, is knifed to death from behind. One of the brothers then goes to tell the sister of the deed. She hastens to the braes and, seeing her lover dead, faints and/or drinks his blood, kisses him, and combs his hair in her grief. She either ties her own three-quarter-length hair about her neck and chokes herself to death, takes her lover's body home and pregnant dies of a broken heart, or refuses the sympathy offered her by her father. In some versions, she curses the oxen and kye that have caused the original trouble between the two families. (See Child, IV, 164.)
The Type A text does not follow the Child texts (A-L) summarized above, but rather seems a variation of the Q-S ( The Dowie Dens of T arrow) series, a group of texts in which ten lovers fight over a girl and in which the father or sister is the dream-reader and clairvoyant of the lover's death. The two titles (Siegmeister's in Sgs Early Am and Child's, Q-S) are almost identical, "dewy" replacing "dowie". The fight among the seven sons over the girl is a logical step from the confused ten lovers beginning in Child Q-S. The presence of the mother, instead of the father or sister, as reader of the dream and encourager of the bereft girl, is no great change, particularly when we note the insertion of the "make my bed" cliche in the Siegmeister text and remember the similarity of this situation to the ones in Barbara Allen (Child 84) and Lady Alice (Child 85) where the mother is present. And, finally, the girl does die in both Child Q and S, even though the dressing in white and the return to the river are not in Child.
The other American texts cannot be traced to Child's The Braes of Yarrow- with any finality. Cox, F-S South, 137 points out that his West Virginia text, which came to America from Scotland, is from the William Hamilton poem that Ramsay printed on p. 242 of the third or London edition of the Tea-Table Miscellany, 1733. (See also Anderson's British Poets, Edinburgh, 1794, IX, 426.) This poem is noted by Child, IV, 163, footnote to have affected his J, K, and particularly L versions. Hamilton based it on the ballad story, and it consists of a conversation between three speakers. A man is requesting a bride to forget her past and rejoice in him, while a friend wonders why she is so sad and what story lies behind the situation. It is then revealed that the
man has slain the girl's lover on the braes of Yarrow, and she cannot forgive him or forget. The poem ends indefinitely with the new lover still trying to persuade the girl of the futility of her mourning. The Cox text retains this story, although it is incomplete and the speakers are not marked as in the poem. Stanzas I 6 (Cox i 6) and 1516 (Cox 78) are reproduced with almost no textual variation. Thus the lyricism and poetic style of the sophisticated work have been retained in oral tradition.
The Child Braes of Yarrow undoubtedly came over to Maine in a traditional form. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 291 reports a stanza from what he terms a lost version of Child 214 in a song sung by a Maine woman to the tune of Barbara Allen. The stanza, which begins "Last night I made my bed so wide, Tonight I'll make it narrow", is similar to Stanza 19 in Quid L, but is also of a very conventional nature. Barry also prints a fragment that contains the word "Yarrow" and a stanza similar to one that Child, IV, 179, thought had intruded into Rare Willie Drowned in Yarrow (Child 215) from 214. See Child 215 in this study. And, finally, he found another Maine woman who had heard Child A of The Braes of Yarrow sung in Ireland in her youth.
215. RARE WILLIE DROWNED IN YARROW or THE WATER O GAMRIE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 292 (listed as Barry B of Child 214) / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 69.
Local Titles: Yarrow.
Story Types: A.: A girl's betrothed lover has gone hunting and sent a letter back to her that he is too young to marry. She ominously dreams that she is pulling heather on the braes of Yarrow.' She then goes searching for her lover and finds him drowned. She wraps her long yellow hair about his waist and pulls him out of Yarrow.
Examples: Eddy.
Discussion: This ballad has become confused with The Braes of Yarrow in Britain as well as in this country. The story of Rare Willie in Child is as follows: Willie, his mother's darling, fails (in most cases) to get parental blessing for his marriage. On the way to church, he is washed from his horse while crossing a river or some such body of water. The bride, hearing what
has happened, sets out to find the missing groom. In texts A, B, and C, which do not give many preliminary details, she discovers the body in the cleft of a rock and by wrapping her three-quarter-length hair about Willie's
waist draws him from the water (B, C).
The three "southern" versions of the story (A, B, C) are said by Child, IV, 178, to be the older tradition of this ballad. It is probable that these texts, which now only state that Willie is to marry the girl, originally contained a similar, if not identical, story background to the one given above from the "northern" texts. Child also points out that the wrapping of the hair about the lover's waist in his 215 B and C belongs to 214, as do the "dream", the "letter", and "the wide and narrow bed" stanzas of the six stanza 215 C. In short, four of the half dozen stanzas of this version of Rare Willie have come from The Braes of Yarrow. The situation becomes further confused when he notes (IV, 163) that the drowning of 214, probably belongs to 215, The Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 69 text is printed under the contradictory heading Rare Willie Drowned in Yarrow, Child 214. This text is, in reality, close to Child 215 C, which, as noted above, has been badly corrupted by 214 and undoubtedly brought with, it across the ocean the large amount of borrowed material. As the Eddy notes and remarks (see pp. 6970) seem to reveal some confusion on this point and as Rare Willie is rare indeed in this country, I have compiled a stanza by stanza analysis of the Ohio text.
The first stanza of the Ohio song is closely paralleled in all four lines by the opening stanzas of both Child 215 A and C. The second Ohio stanza is not to be found in Child 215, but it is of a conventional sort that turns up frequently in love song. These lines are probably a corruption, although the fact that they mention the hunt is of interest as almost all the Child 214 texts include this feature. The third Ohio stanza is quite like the second stanza of Child 215 C, which lends extra credance to the corruption theory for Ohio Stanza 2. The second stanza of 215 C is one of those that Child believed to have been borrowed from The Braes of Yarrow. The fourth Ohio stanza relates to Child 214 in that the girl goes up a hill to spy her lover and
is closest to 214 J, Stanza 14 of all the Child stanzas in the two ballads. The drowning, however, is like 215, and thus like 214!, also, while the use of a rock as the repository of the body is in 215 A and B. The final Ohio stanza compares closely to 21 5 C, Stanza 5 and 215 B, Stanza 2. This evidence would serve to indicate that the Ohio text is a version of Child 215 and perhaps a variant of 215 C.
Barry, Brit Bids Me; 292 prints a fragment containing the line "Between two hills of Yarrow", beginning with lines similar to Child 215 A, Stanza 2, and mentioning Willie. See also Child 214!!, Stanza 17. Child said that his 215 A, Stanza 2 had entered Rare Willie from his 214, and, therefore, Barry has seen fit to put the fragment under the title The Braes of Yarrow.
217. THE BROOM OF COWDENKNOWES
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 293.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: A group of gentlemen ride past a milkmaid, and one of them stops to seduce her. He gives her three guineas when he is through and says if he is not back in half a year that she must look no more for him. She shows him the highway by Tay and he departs. Her father suspects her when she returns home, but she denies anyone has been with her.
Examples : Barry.
Discussion: The Maine fragment ends upon the denial by the girl that anyone has been with her. The Child A text, close to the Maine song, rounds out the story as known to one Maine Irishwoman in her youth. See Barry, Brit Bids Me, 295. A few months later, the girl is out with the sheep when another group of riders comes by. One, to her shame, asks her who got her
with child. This man subsequently reveals himself to be the lover and turns out to be a very rich one at that.
There is a popular song, not traditional however, of similar name and story structure also known in Maine. See Child, IV, 192 and 208. Consult also The Warbler (Peter Edes, printer), Augusta, Me., 1805.
218. THE FALSE LOVER WON BACK
Texts: Belden, Mo F-S, 78 / Golden Book, IX, 50 / JAFL, XXXIV, 395.
Local Titles: The True Lover.
Story Types: A: A girl watches her lover pass her door and asks him where
he is going. He replies that he is on his way to woo a girl lovelier than she.
She is philosophical about his fickleness, but warns him that she will turn
to other men. Then she follows him, and at each town he buys her a present
and tells her to go home. She persists, and finally he buys her a wedding
gown. Examples: Belden.
Discussion: This ballad is not easy to find in America. The Missouri text
is like Child A. However, John Moore (JAFL, XXXIV, 396) points out that
the Missouri version suppresses three stanzas in which the girl persistently
asks her lover if he will not be fond of her again and one stanza in which he
says she can turn to other men if she wishes but he will be true to his new
love. These four stanzas all appear in Child 218 A.
219. THE GARDENER
Reed Smith lists this ballad among the survivals of the Child ballads in
America. See SFLQ, I, $2, 9 n. I have not, however, been able to find a
published text. Child, V, 258 9 indicates that this song, Seeds of Love, and
A Spring of Thyme have exchanged material. Some of The Gardener may
have entered America in one of these two works.
221. KATHERINE JAFFRAY
Texts: Katharine Jaffray: Brown Coll / Minish Mss.
Squire of Edinborough: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 400 / Child, IV, 218 (headnote) / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 22 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 141,
Local Titles: Katherine Jeffrys; A Scotch Ditty, Katherine Joffray, The Squire of Edinboroughtown-
Story Types: A: Lord Willie courts Katherine and gains the consent of her parents to the marriage. Although promised, the girl falls in love with a second, dashing suitor. Lord Robert from across the border. She says that she will marry him if there is any way. Robert thus attends the wedding as a guest, saying simply that he came because he wished to see Kate on her wedding day. Katherine toasts Robert with a glass of wine, and at that sign the lover takes the girl by her white hand and grass green sleeve, and they flee, galloping over the border. "Her kin did them no harm".
Examples : Minish Mss.
B: The Squire of Edinborough type: A girl, ready to marry a squire's lad, is forced to accept another gentleman. She writes her lover of her plight, and he sends lis answer with a ring, telling her to wear green at her nuptials. She answers that she will marry him in spite of all. On the wedding day, the lover brings a large group of men and attends the ceremony. He mock-toasts the groom, and, in response to the latter's challenge to a fight, asks for a kiss from the bride, after which he promises to leave. The request granted, he slips his arm about the girl and whisks her away to Edinborough.
Examples: Barry (A), Creighton, Flanders.
Discussion: The Type A text, a rare find in this country, follows the Child A version closely for ten stanzas, although it displays some contact with print. The battle at Cowden Banks is omitted, however, and the lovers merely escape in the North Carolina version. Also, the Scottish-English rivalry is no longer a feature of the song, even if the border locale is still discernable.
The Squire of Edinboroughtown is a later remodelling of Katherine Jaffray, probably from print. See Child, IV, 2178. This song (Type B) has survived in both Scottish and Irish versions in Northeastern United States and Canada.
Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 144 suggests that Katherine Jaffray was recomposed in Scotland as The Squire, but the wearing of green by the bride (see Child, IV, 218) surely points to Irish tradition for those texts that include it. No Scots girl would dare clothe herself in that "ill-starred" color.
225. ROB ROY
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 296.
Local Titles: Rob Roy.
Story Types: A: Rob Roy attacks a border house to carry off as his wife a woman who detests him. He surrounds the place, enters, and takes the girl from her mother's embrace, although she refuses to go willingly.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: The Canadian fragment consists of the first five stanzas of Child A and was not sung. The Child song continues the story through the forced marriage, the return to Scotland, Rob Roy's departure for France, and his promise to teach the girl to dance. The ballad is based on history (see Child, IV, 243 5). Robert Oig abducted Jean Key, a young, rich widow, and forced her to marry him in 1750. Four years later he was taken and executed.
226. LIZIE LINDSAY
Texts: Advertiser (Aurora, Mo.), 5 22 '41, 2 / Barry, Brit Elds Me, 297/ Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 135 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 36 / Randolph, Os F-S, I, 164. Local Titles: Leezie Lindsay, New Yealand.
Story Types: A: There are a few extremely abbreviated versions of the Child story in America. A man asks a girl to go to the highlands with him. She refuses, for she knows neither him nor his home. However, the girl's maid wishes she were in a position to accept the man's offer. The girl then dresses up und leaves with her suitor. Upon their arrival at his home, she is
shown the land into which she has married. The real story seems forgotten.
Examples: Brewster, Randolph.
B : A little lyric request of a lover, in which he asks a girl "to go to the highlands", exists as a song. She refuses.
Examples : Barry.
Discussion: A derivative of Lizie Lindsay is to be found in this country. But, because of the fragmentary nature of some of the texts, it is difficult to be certain just how much of the traditional song is and has been in America. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 298 9 discusses this point in some detail in connection with his northern fragments. It seems certain that a few stanzas of the traditional ballad have come over in the derivative form of the song, and the incomplete Indiana, West Virginia,, and Arkansas texts appear to be genuine.
In the Child B version we are told how a young nobleman goes to get a wife in Edinburgh under the disguise of being a shepherd. The girl selected is reluctant to leave home and go with a poor stranger, but is persuaded to do so by her maid. She goes and is homesick, but learns the next day on getting up to milk the kye that she has married a rich man.
The Blaeberry Courtship, the song derived from Lizie Lindsay, exists in a number of American versions. See JAFL, XXXV, 345 from Illinois and MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 69 from Nova Scotia. This story tells of an educated and disguised Highlander who convinces a lowland girl to go with him against her parents' advice and who makes her a great lady. The "milk
cows" refrain allies it closely to Child 226.
The New Brunswick text, which may be influenced by both the tradition of the Child ballad and the derivative song, has lost the story and retains only a four-stanza request "to go to the highlands". The Arkansas version consists of a single stanza of request and a second stanza concerning the departure which is somewhat similar to Child C, Stanza 12. Nor can the Indiana fragment be allied directly to any Child version, although it resembles Child, IV, 524 in the first stanza and the name of the hero, Donald MacDonald. The West Virginia text is quite similar to this one.
233. ANDREW LAMMIE
Texts: MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc y 60.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Typts: A: A fragmentary story of a girl whose father beats her, and whose mother and brother scorn and mistrust her. Her love died for her today; she will die for him tomorrow.
Examples : MacKenzie.
Discussion: This Nova Scotia fragment, which was received in two parts from two singers, is closest to the Child C text. The story, as told there, is of a rich miller's daughter who falls in love with a trumpeter in the service of Lord Fyvie. She wants to marry him, but finds the match scorned by her father. When the trumpeter has to go to Edinburgh for a time, the girl Annie,
knowing she will die before he returns, plans a tryst with him at a bridge. (In Scotland, lovers who part at a bridge shall never meet again.) He says he will buy her a wedding gown while away, and they are to marry on his return. But she bids him farewell forever. The trumpeter goes to the top of the castle and blows a blast that is heard in the girl's home. Her parents beat her, and her brother breaks her back. Lord Fyvie passes and tries to convince the miller to change his mind, but to no avail. The father insists on a better match. The girl is put to bed where she dies of a broken heart. The father laments, and Andrew, on his return, dies of grief. However, in the New World fragment we have an example of a cliche ("make my bed") overriding the story to the extent that the lover is said to have died before his true love.
236. THE LAIRD DRUM
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 300 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Micb> 149. Local Titles: The Laird (Knight) and the Shepherd's Daughter, The Laird o' Drum.
Story Types: A: A nobleman out hunting spies a sliepherd's lass who immediately captivates him. In the New Brunswick text, he offers to marry her and, in spite of her protests that he is joking, says he will go with her to herd sheep. Examples: Barry, Gardner and Chickering.
Discussion: The event, the marriage of Alexander Irvine to a woman of mean birth against his family's wishes, on which this ballad is based is given in Child, IV, 322. The American fragments have lost the story to some extent and, except for the last stanza in the New Brunswick version, make no reference to the family's objections. This Canadian stanza and its lines "For
it's herdin' sheep on yon hillside I'll gang wi' you my lovely Nancy" could result in a change in the story.
Barry, Brit -Bids Me, 301 points out that the Child versions of this ballad fall into two groups: the older forms that stick close to history (A, C, D, E, etc.) and the more recent forms which do not mention the suitor by name and do not indicate a previous marriage (B). The Canadian fragment shows influence from both groups, but follows the recent tradition more closely. Child, IV, 122 suspects his B version to have been contaminated by a song in the Motherwell Mss. concerning an earl and a shepherd's daughter. The Canadian fragment reflects the influence of this song, too, in the fact that the suitor's father is alive. (Barry, op. cit., 301 3.)
Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 149 indicate that Robert Chambers (ed.) in The Songs in Scotland Prior to Burns (London, 1862), 440 I names a song with identical words to the Michigan fragment which was composed by a well-born vagabond, Jean Glover. The text also resembles the Canadian fragment. Stanza 3 of the Michigan text is almost identical to Stanza 3 of the Canadian.
240. THE RANTIN LADDIE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 303 / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 145.
Local Titles: The Rantin' Laddie.
Story Types: A: A poor girl, with a dubious past, has a bastard child by a nobleman. Her family scorns her; so she sends one of her father's servants to tell her "laddie" of her plight. He responds gallantly and sends a retinue to fetch the girl, Maggie, home as his bride.
Examples: Combs.
B: A short song remains from the ballad. It implies a dubious past and a bastard child of the girl.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: The Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, version follows 'Child A and C in story, while the Canadian fragment represents a lyric remain which contains only the first stanza of the actual ballad. A "hush-a-by" refrain, unknown elsewhere to this song, rounds out the piece.
243. JAMES HARRIS or THE DAEMON LOVER
Texts: Adventure, 730 '23, 191 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 304. / Belden, Mo F-S, 79 / BTewster, BldsSgsInd, 136; Brown Coll/ JBFSSNE, VI, 7; VII, io/ Bull U Sc#i62,pu [ Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 38 / Child, IV, 361 / Cox, F-S South, 139 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 38 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLIV, 388 / Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 208 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 69 / Davis, 7rd Bid Fa, 439 / Dean, The Flying Cloud, 55 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 91 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 70 / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 80 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 95 / Focus, IV, 162 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 54 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 27 / Gilbert, Lost Chords, 35 / Grapurchat, East Radford (Va.) State Teachers College, 8 25 '32 / Alberta P. Hannum, Thursday April, 89 / Harper's Mgz (May, 1915), 91 1 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 1 16 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Aplcbns, 59 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 119 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, # 19 / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XVIII, 207; XIX, 295 ; XX, 257; XXV, 274 ; XXVI, 360; XXX, 325 ; XXXV, 347; XLIX, 209; XHI, 274; XLV, 21 ; XL VIII, 295; LII, 465 LVII, 74 / Luther, Amcns Their Sgs, 17 / Macintosh, So III F-S, 33 / Mason, Cannon Cnty, 19 / Minish Mss / MLN, XIX, 238 / Mod Phil, II, 575 / Morris, F-S Flo, 464 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, io / Neal, Brown Cnty, 69 / New York broadside: "The House Carpenter" (J. Andrews, N.Y., c. 1850) / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 34/ Ozark Life, V, #8 / Perry, Carter Cnty, 160 / Pound, Am JBlds Sgs, 43 / Pound, Neor Syllables, io / PTFLS, X, 159 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, i66/ Randolph, OzMtFlk, 201 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 66 / Scarborough,
Sgctchr So Mts, 150 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplchns, #29 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 244 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / SFLQ, II, 75; VIII, 160 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 151 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 44 / Stout, F-L la, 11 / Thomas, Devil's Ditties, 172 / Va FLS Bidl, ^fes 2 12 / Wilson, Bckzods Am, 96 / Wyman and Brockway, 20 Ky Mt Sgs, 54.
Local Titles: A Warning for Married Women, James Harris, Little Closet Door, (Well Met, Well Met) My Old True Love, On the Banks of the Sweet Laurie, The Banks of Claudy, The Carpenter's Wife, The Daemon Lover, The House Carpenter, The Faithless Wife, The House Carpenter's Wife, The Salt Salt Sea, The Salt Water Sea, The Sea Captain, The Ship Carpenter.
Story Types: A: A sailor returns home and, though faithful himself even to the point of refusing a princess, finds his true love happily married to a carpenter. However, by promises and cajoling, he persuades the woman to leave her husband and children and sail off with him. She consents, but soon regrets leaving her baby and sometimes envisions torment that is in store for her. lite ship sinks. Often, a stanza is added telling of her contrition or of the condition of her deserted babe and husband. But curses on deceiving men and warnings to erring women also conclude various texts.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden (C), Davis (B), SharpK (A).
B : The story is similar to that of Type A. However, the demonaic quality of the lover is still evident to some degree through his ability to interpret the woman's vision, or through some similar hint.
Examples: Davis (M, N), Scarborough (D, E), SharpK (B, L).
C: The usual story is told. However, after the lover identifies Heaven and Hell "where you and I must go", he sinks the ship purposely.
Examples: PTFLS, X, 161 (B).
D: The story is similar to that of Type A. However, the girl leaps over-board and drowns, while the lover goes down with the ship.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (D); Eddy (A); PTFLS, X, 161 (A).
E : The usual story is told. However, the boat does not sink, although the girl rues her decision to run away. This type is of course the result of fragmentation. Examples: Chappell
F: A type of story, independent of 'The House Carpenter tradition, has been found. In this type George Allis reminds the wife of her late promises that she would go with him in seven years and a day. She goes, in what prove to be golden ships with silken sails, but is "sorry sore" on seeing the banks of Claudy where seven ships sink to the bottom and are never more seen. Allis is clearly a ghost, but his demonaic qualities are not made fully apparent- Examples ; SFSSNE, VI, 9.
Discussion: The story of the Child (IV, 361) versions is that of Jane Reynolds and a sailor, James Harris, who exchange marriage vows. The young man is pressed into service and reported dead after three years. Jane marries a ship carpenter, and they live happily for four years and have children. One night when the carpenter is absent from home, a spirit raps
on the window and says that he is James Harris come to clain his love after seven long years. She explains what has happened, but consents to go where he says he can support her well. In most versions, she repents on shipboard, but the boat goes down and she dies in one manner or another. Anyway, she is never heard of again, and her husband hangs himself.
In America, the lover and the wife (except for the "Fair Ellen" name that seems to have drifted into the song from Lord Thomas and Fair Annet; see Davis, Trd Bid Fa, E, F, K, N, Q) have lost their names (Type A). The carpenter is usually a "house" carpenter and not a "ship" carpenter. (In Gilbert's text the ship carpenter steals the house carpenter's wife.) The action before the arrival of the spirit and the aftermath concerning the death of the carpenter are left out. And the demonaic nature of the lover has been rationalized. In connection with this final point, a number of versions (Type B) retain vestiges of the eerie lover in the form of the "hills of heaven" stanzas (Child E and F), although the cloven foot is not present. The PTFLS, X, 161, B version (Type C) follows Child E and F somewhat further in that the lover sinks the ship to get to Hell. Type D stories show a variation not in Child, as the grief of the girl reaches a suicidal peak. This change seems to me to be a sentimentalization. Type E is caused by omission and could result from the cutting short of any text. However, such abbreviation might well be important enough to cause a new version. Type F follows Child A in keeping the name of the lover and, with the text in Greig, Last Leaves Traditional Bid, 196, is one of the few versions surviving that is not a part of The House Carpenter tradition. The text was also recognized by an Irish woman in New York The miraculous gilded ship(s) is in Child A, B, C, and F. Check
BFSSNE, VII, 10 for an additional line.
Most American copies are close to the deMarsan (N. Y.) broadside (c. 1860), printed by Barry in JAFL, XVIII, 207. This text resembled Child B most closely. Belden, Mo F-S, 79 expresses the opinion that print has perpetuated this ballad orally, and on p. 80 he discusses the Missouri American texts in detail. Davis, op. cit. y 439 also is a source of information.
James Harris has been subject to much corruption in its American travels. Davis, op. cit., 440, 4631!. discusses these changes and prints examples. His list o corrupting songs includes The False Young Man, The True Lover's Farewell, The Rejected Lover, The Wagoner's Lad, Cold Winter's Night, and Careless Love. See also the Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, "Little Closet Door" text, p. 91 and the Corruption Chart at the end of this paper.
It should be noted that in only a few American versions does the girl weep for her husband. (See Belden, op. cit., C and Davis, op. cit., I.), and in Davis, op. cit., the girl refuses to go, but leaves anyway. Also note the change in the first stanza ("I could have married a railroader. . . but I married a house carpenter") in Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 12 (D).
There is no parallel European tradition of this ballad. However the Danes have a song concerning a treacherous woman, and the English song did originate in Scotland two facts that may or may not be related.
248. THE GREY COCK or SAW YOU MY FATHER?
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 310 / Isaiah Thomas Collection, Worcester Mass, III, 50 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Apkbns, #30 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 259.
Local Titles: None given.
Story Types: A: A girl awaits her lover. After some confused hindrances, lie comes to the door when all are asleep. She lets him in, pledges to love him, and entreats the cock not to crow too early. The lover is obviously a ghost. From Child we know that the cock crows too early, and the tryst is ended too soon.
Examples: Barry.
B: A girl is thinking of her lover and weeping for her parents, when the lover comes. Finding all the doors shut, he rings. She gets up and lets him in. They go to bed, and, in spite of the girl's entreaties, the fowls crow two hours too early. She sends her love away by moonlight, asking him when he will return. He replies a ballad "never", and she berates herself for thinking him
to be true. The ghostly mood is gone; the song is just another night assignation story.
Examples : SharpK.
Discussion: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 313 capably refutes the tendency to place this ballad in the aube tradition (see Child, headnote; C. R. Baskerville, PMLA, XXXVI, 565 ff.) and shows that the bird belongs to Celtic (from Oriental) folklore. He also prints an old song, The Lover's Ghost, on p. 312, op. cit., from Joyce's Old Irish Music, 219 that is connected to The Grey Cocky if not to the extent that Barry claims. See also the intrusion of Child 248 into Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight (Child 4) in the Minish Mss.
In the American versions, the ghostly nature of the lover is almost gone. Particularly, in the SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, is this feature obscured, only the fowls (not even cocks) as the signal for the lover to leave remains of the supernatural elements.
Type A is very close to the Child text, but Type B is noticeably different, though the basic outline of the story is the same.
George P. Jackson, Spiritual F-S Early Am, 44 points out that Anne Gilchrist (JFSS, VIII, 6591) has stated that this song and the religious song, Saw Ye My Saviour? are closely related.
250. HENRY MARTYN
This ballad has been treated under Sir Andrew Barton (Child 167).
252. THE KITCHIE-BOY
Reed Smith (SFLQ, I, # 2, 9 n) included this ballad on his list of Child ballads that have survived in this country. I have not, however, been able to locate a published text.
Attention should be directed, nevertheless, to W. R. Nelles article in JAFL, XXII, 42 ff. on Hind Horn in which he discusses The Kitchie-Boy as an off-shoot of the Horn tradition. See the chart on p. 59 in his article.
266. JOHN THOMPSON AND THE TURK
See Vermont Historical Society, Proceedings, N. S., VII, 73 98.
267. THE HEIR OF LINNE
Texts: Davis, Trd Bid 7 a, 479 / 7 a FLS Bull, #6.
Local Titles: The Heir of Linne.
Story Types: A: The heir of Linne sells his land to John o' Scales and squanders money for nearly a year. Then he is forced to beg without much luck. He recalls a note that his father gave him for use in a time of dire need, and the message reveals three chests of money in a castle wall. He takes the gold and goes back to John as if he were poor. John's wife will not trust him with a single cent. One man offers to lend him money. John offers to resell the lands for one hundred marks less than the original sale price. Linne takes the bargain to the consternation of John and wife, makes the man who offered to lend him money a keeper of his forest, and promises never to put his estate in jeopardy again.
Examples: Davis.
Discussion: The Virginia version is derived from the text published by Percy in his Reliques (1765), II, 309 and (1794), H I2- Thus the American form of the ballad is close to Child A, though much compressed and corrupted by some of the additions made by Percy and taken by him from The Drunkard's Legacy (see Child, V, 12 for a summary of the plot). The additions
are noted by Davis, Trd Sid 7a; 479 to be the introduction of the "lonesome lodge", "the rope 35 , and "one hundred marks" instead of "twenty pounds".
There is a North Carolina text (The Sea Contain) dealing with a sea-captain who appears poor and is rejected as a suitor for Polly's hand by the girl's mother. When he turns out rich, the mother does an about-face and even offers the couple a bed at once. He refuses and sets out to get drunk. , XXVIII, 156. The song is not uncommon. For similar stories see JAFL XXV, 7 and Randolph, The Ozarks, 190. These songs may be considered derivatives or distant relations to the Child ballad, at best; their
original was the English broadside known as The Liverpool Landlady or Jack Tar, although Young Johnny or Johnny the Sailor are the common American titles.
272. THE SUFFOLK MIRACLE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me; 314 / Brown Coll / BFSSNJE, V } 7 / Cox, F-S Soutb^ 152 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 482 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 98 / Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 86 / Morris, F-S Fla, 470 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 179 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns. I / ShaipK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, I, 262 / SFLQ, VIII, 162.
Local Titles: A Lady Near New York Town, Jimmy and Nancy, Miss Betsy, The Holland Handkerchief, The Suffolk Miracle, There Was a Farmer.
Story Types: A: A lovely girl who has fallen in love with a young man is sent far away by her father. The young man dies. After awhile he appears at the place where the girl is living. He is mounted on her father's horse and carries her mother's gear, and he says that he has come to take her home. As they ride, he complains of a headache, and she ties a handkerchief about his head. At home, the young man goes to put up the horse while she knocks on the door. The father is amazed to see her, and his amazement is greater when he learns how she arrived. Later, they find the horse alone and in a sweat. It is then decided to open the grave, and, sure enough, the handkerchief is found about the head of the twelve-months corpse.
Examples: Davis (A, B), Flanders, SharpK (A).
Discussion: Child, V, 58 ff. points out that the English text is not truly a popular ballad, but he has included it because it represents, in enfeebled form, a great European story. He summarizes a Cornwall prose tale on the same subject, which he states to be "much nearer to the Continental tale".
The American versions follow the Child story, although they are more compact and leave out the death of the girl. As Morris (SFLQ, VIII, 162) points out, on the whole they show an improvement in the literary style and feeble narrative of Child's text. They also include a number of variations in narrative detail. The Cox, F-S South, 153 West Virginia version has lost the
handkerchief sequence entirely. In the story as told by a Maine woman (Barry, Brit Bids Me, 314) the handkerchief is already around the dead man's head when he arrives at the girl's door. And the Morris (SFLQ, VIII, 162) version has the unique feature of the wound which speaks and requests the lady to unloose the bonds binding it.
SharpK, Eng F-S So A$lchns 9 A version has a moral stanza at the beginning and end, while the Randolph, Oz F-S, A text is quite corrupt.
For a discussion of the superiority of northern American versions and the relation of southern American versions to the "sophisticated Child A" see Barry in SFSSNE, V, 10.
273. KING EDWARD THE FOURTH AND THE TANNER OF TAMWORTH
Reed Smith, SC Bids, 171 4 lists this song among the American survivals of Child ballads. I have been unable to find a published text. However, as the song is not on Smith's subsequent SFLQ, I, 22, 911 list, I believe the first entry to be a mistake.
274. OUR GOODMAN
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 315 / Belden, Mo F-S, 89 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 149 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 72 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 41 / Cox, F-S South, 154 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 58, 92 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 485 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 103 / Eddy, Bids Sgs Ohio, 82 / Finger, Frontier Bids, 161 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 1 13 / Henry, Beech Mt F-S, 14 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 1 19 / Henry, Sgs Sng So Apkhns, 14 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 122 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #20 / Hummel, Oz F-S / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / JAFL, XVIII, 294; XXX, 199 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 261 / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sngng Cntry, 300 / Luther, Amcns Their Sgs, 18 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 62 1 Musical Quarterly, II, 125 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, 14 / Parsons, F-T Andros Is, 162 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 181 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 225 / Ring, Mid-Hudson Sg Verse, 3 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 231 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplchns, #32 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 267 / Reed Smith, SC Bids, 159 / SFLQ, V, 169 / Stout, F-L la, 13 / Va FLS Bull, :|s 25 / J. G. Whittier, Yankee Gypsies.
Local Titles; A Blackguard Song, An Old Man Came Tumbling Home, Cairo Girl, Down Came the Old Man, Four Nights, Hobble and Bobble, Home Came the Old Man, Home Comes the (Good) (Old) Man, I Called to my Loving Wife, In Came the Gay Old Man, Kind Wife, Our (The) Goodman, Parson Jones, The Adulteress, The Old Man, Three Nights of Experience, Third Night of Married Life, When I Come Home the Other Night.
Story Types: A: A man returning home finds another man's horse, hat, sword, etc. standing where his should be. His wife tells him that his eyes are deceiving him, that the objects that he sees are really cows, churns, milk dashers, etc. However, he is not to be duped.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden (A), Davis (A).
B : The story and motif are indentical to those in Type A, except for the fact that the woman is entertaining three lovers.
Examples: Davis (B); JAFL, XVIII, 294.
C: The story and motif are identical to those in Type A. However, the action takes place on three or four consecutive nights.
Examples : Henry, Sgs Sng So Aflchns; Lomax and Lomax; Scarborough (A, B).
Discussion: In America, the objects seen by the returning husband vary greatly, but the story itself is always approximately the same. Type A follows the outline of the Scottish Child A; Type B, that of English Child B; while Type C seems to be a more recent variation. Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 102 notes that the song is often recited as a dialogue. See also JAFL, XXX, 199.
The story, of course, readily lends itself to crudity and ribaldry. Cox, F-S South, points out that there are several such stanzas to be found in West Virginia and other states, while Randolph, OzF-S, I, 183, headnote, reports encountering a man who said he no longer sings certain verses of this song since he has joined the church. See Hudson, F-S Miss, 122 and Duncan, op.
dt., 1 02 as well.
The Sharp K, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, A version reveals the shrewish nature of the wife in the opening stanza. Davis, Tr d Bid Fa, 493 prints a Jacobite adaption from the British Navy in which the lover is a Tory cousin of the husband named Macintosh. See also Smith's Scotish Minstrel, IV, 66.
275. GET UP AND BAR THE DOOR
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 318 / Brown Coll / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 147 / Cox, F-S South, 5x6 / Davidson's Universal Melodist, I, Z75 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 495 / Gardner and Dickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 371 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 41 / Jones, F-L Mich, 5 / Randolph, Oz F-S, 1, 186 / SFLQ, XIII, 170 / Va FLS Bull, # 9 .
Local Titles: Arise and Bar the Door -O, Get Up and Bar the Door, John and Joan Blount, Old John Jones.
Story Types: A: A housewife is boiling pudding when a cold wind blows the door open. The husband tells her to bar the door; however, she is busy and refuses. They agree that the first one who speaks must shut the door. Two travellers, attracted by the light from the open door, enter the house. Getting no reply to any of their questions or remarks, they eat and drink
what they find. The husband and wife watch, saying nothing. One of the travellers proposes to take off the man's beard (and in some texts decides to use the hot pudding to soften it), while the other traveller plans to kiss the wife. This last proposal brings some words from the husband, and he has to bar the door.
Examples: Barry (A), Combs, Gardner and Chickering.
B: The story is essentially the same as that of Type A. However, the husband and wife get sleepy on home-brewed ale and go to bed forgetting to bar the door. The agreement is made, and the travellers come. They eat and drink downstairs and then go up and pull the wife out of bed and begin to kiss her on the floor. This freedom is too much for the husband. Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield.
Discussion: The Type A texts follow the Child A and B story closely. However, Type B seems to be of a different sort from anything in Child. It resembles Child C in that the couple go to bed, there are three travellers, and the wife is laid on the floor, but the narrative is fuller and the door is not blown open, as in Child.
The fragmentary B version in Randolph's Oz F-S indicates that the men actually shave off the husband's beard.
Crude lyrics are easily and often inserted into this ballad. For other tales of the same sort see Child, V, 96 8. For a burlesque of the ballad see Delehanty and Hengler's Song and Dance Book (1874), 169.
277. THE WIFE WRAPT IN WETHER'S SKIN
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 322 / Bdden, Mo F-S, 92 / Brewster, Bids Sgs 2nd, 151 / Brown Coll / Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 74 / Child, V, 304 / Cox, F-S South, 1 59 / Cox, Trd BU W V&, 46 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 92 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 497 / Downes and Siegmeister, Treasry Am Sg, 226 / Flanders, Garl Gn Mt Sg, 84 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 222, 224 / Focus, V, 280 / Gordon, F-S Am, 89 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 78 / Henry, F-S So Hgbldsy 125 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 123 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 12 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #21 / JAFL, VII, 253 ; XIX, 298 ; XXX, 328 ; XXXIX, 109 ; XLVIII, 309 ; LVT, 103 / N.r.
Times Mgz, i S '28 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 16 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 187 / Ring, NE F-S, 8 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #33 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 271 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 8 / SFLQ, XIII, 172 / Smith and Rufty, Am Antb Old Wrld Bids, 49 / Fa FLS Butt, #s 4, 5, 7 10. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 41,
Local Titles: Bandoo, Dandoo, Dan-Doodle-Dan, Dan-you, Dindo-Dan, Gentle Virginia, Jenny Flow Gentle Rosemary, Old Man Come in From His Plow, Robin He's Gone to the Woods, Sweet Robin, The Old Man Who Lived in the West, The Old Sheepskin, The Scolding Wife, The Wee Cooper o' Fife, The Wife Wrapt in Wether's Skin.
Story Types: A: A man marries a girl who is too proud or too shrewish to work. When he returns from the fields at evening, she will not give him his supper. To reform her, he lolls a sheep, cuts a rod, and beats her after wrapping her in the sheepskin, a device which frees him of responsibility. When she threatens to tell her family, he reminds her that he was only tanning the hide. She reforms completely.
Examples: Barry (A); Child (F); Davis (A); Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 222.
B: Certain West Virginia versions mention the old man's running away in the end. The Cox, F-S South, C version has four stanzas of nonsense inserted about the old man's running to his father and saying his wife has lice. All omit the bringing home of the bride.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (A, B, C).
C: The "wether's skin" has been forgotten in some texts, and a man merely beats his wife and reforms her.
Examples: Cox, F-S South (E).
Discussion: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 325 states that "Child F may be a possible intermediary between the earlier English texts and the later American". Whether this belief is true or not, the Child version does seem to me to tell the complete American story, and I have therefore used it as a model for Story Type A. As none of the British Child texts include the man's coming home from his plowing and asking for supper, some of the American texts omit this feature also. On the other hand, other American texts that I have grouped in Type A as well, omit the bringing home of the new bride who will not work and begin the story with the husband's return from the fields. Still other American texts can be found which include both opening scenes. See the examples listed under Type A. Types B and C are, of course, degenerations of this material, one through expansion, the other through loss.
Like the story, the refrains of this ballad are varied and change place and character frequently. Belden, Mo F-S, 92, notes that two general divisions may be made with respect to these refrains: the "dandoo-clish ma dingo" types of the South and Midwest, and the "rosemary-thyme" types of the South and Northeast which probably have been borrowed from The Elfin Knight (Child 2). The "rosemary-thyme" lines may derive from the old plant burden, "juniper, gentian, and rosemary", which can be found rationalized to proper names in Child F and Barry, op. cit., A and B and which has created a new title for the song. See Cox, F-S South, 162.
The ballad and its developments are discussed in some detail by William H. Jansen in HFLQ, IV, #3, 41. He divides the American tradition much in the fashion of Belden, and notes that there is no reform of the wife in the Dandoo texts.
Child, V, 104 states that the ballad is, in all likelihood, derived from the traditional tale, The Wife Lapped in MorreVs Skin, which he summarizes. The story may have blended with another tale, however, before the present version developed. Lucy Broadwood, JFSS, II, 1215, in a note on plant burdens states that plants were regarded as protection against demons and
when a demon vanished the burden often remained. In that case, and providing the plant refrain has not been recently borrowed by the ballad, the wife may have originally had evil spirits, a feature which was later rationalized to her being too proud of kin or too shrewish by nature to work.
The Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, A version has almost lost the story, and, instead of the husband's rationalization of his deed at the end, has the cliche, "if you want any more, you can sing it yourself". The JAFL, LVI, 103 fragment may not be from Child 277.
278. THE FARMER'S CURST WIFE
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 325 / Beck, Sgs Mich Vjks, 107 / Belden, Mo F-S, 947 Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 155 / Brown Coll/ Bull Tenn FLS, VIII, #3, 73 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 42 / Cox, F-S South, 164.1 Crabtree, Overton Cnty, 98 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 18 / Cutting, Adirondack Cnty, 71 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 505 / Downes and Siegmeister, Treasry Am Sg, 228 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, 108 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 226 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 373 / Garrison, Searcy Cnty, 13 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 69 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 125 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 124 / Hummel, Oz F-S / JAFL, XIX, 2985 XXIV, 3485
XXVII, 68; XXX, 329; XLVIII, 299 / Kolb, Treasry F-S, 8 / Linscott, F-S Old NE, 188 / Lomax, Cowboy Sgs Frntr Bids, 110 / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 152 / Louisville Courier-Journal, 114 '177 MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 647 Mason, Cannon Cnty, 75 / Morris, F-S Fla, 472 / Musick, F-L Kirksmlle, 11 A / Niles, Anglo-Am Stdy Bk, 31 / Niles, BldsLvSgs TgcLgds, z/ PTFLS,X, 1 64 /Randolph, Os F-S, I, 1 89 / Randolph, Oz Mt Flk, 227 / SharpC, EngF-S So*Aplchns, #34/ SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 275 / Siegmeister, Sgs Early Am, 44 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 53 / SFLQ, II, 77; IV, 157 / Va FLS Bull, #s 4 6, 8 10. Korson, Pa Sgs Lgds, 39.
Local Titles: A Woman and the Devil, Brave Old Anthony Marela, Hi Lum Day, Jack, Jack's Wife, Kellybumbraes, Ten Little Devils, The Devil and the Fanner's Wife, The Devil Came to the Farmer's One Day, The Devil's Song, The Farmer's Curst Wife, The Old Devil Come to my Plow, The Old Jokey Song, The Old Man under the Hill, The Old Woman and the Devil. The (Old) Scolding Wife.
Story Types: A: The Devil comes to take the farmer's shrewish wife, much to the farmer's delight. The woman is no more controllable in Hell than she was on earth. She kicks the imps about and is generally unmanageable. For the sake of peace and his own safety, the Devil is forced to take her back to the farmer. Upon her return, she sometimes asks for the food she was cooking in the pot when she left. Once and awhile she hits her husband, too. There is usually a comic, philosophic last stanza.
Examples: Belden (A), Davis (A), SharpK (A).
B: The story is like that of Type A. However, this feature is added: the farmer, having no oxen to plow his farm, lores the Devil, who abducts the wife as payment. Examples: Barry (C).
C: The Devil takes so many things from the farmer in accordance with a pact between them that soon the poor man has only his hogs left to plow with. The Devil then abducts the wife, and the usual story ensues.
Examples: Gardner and Chickering (E).
D: The usual story is told. In the end, however, the farmer welcomes his wife back and congratulates her for killing the imps and ruling Hell.
Examples: Barry (D).
E: The usual story is told, but, as in some of the Type A texts, the woman asks for the food in the pot on her return, only to find that is has all been eaten up. She also brags to her husband of her accomplishments in Hades.
Examples: Cox.
F: The usual story is told. As in Types A and E the woman asks for the food in the pot on her return. She follows this query by beating her husband, who is sick in bed, on the head with a pipe.
Examples: Randolph, OzF-S (B); SharpK (B).
Discussion: This ballad and a related song, The Devil in Search of a Wife, were London broadsides of the nineteenth century. Child prints only two versions of the traditional song, of which the A text is most like the majority of the American ballads. In this country, however, a mock aphoristic closing stanza on shrewish women is almost universally found, and the Child B
ending, in which the returning wife asks for the food (mush, chicken, bread, etc.) she was cooking when abducted is not at all uncommon. See Types E and F.
Barry, Brit Bids Me y 332, pieces together his conception of the original story. The farmer has made a pact with the Devil for aid, as he has no oxen to plow his fields. Satan returns for the soul of one member of the family as payment. As in Child A, the farmer is relieved that his eldest son is not desired. This explanation would account for Type B stories and is lent support by the Maine, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia versions that find the farmer yoking the swine to his plow. (In Siegmeister, Sgs Early Am, 44, from New York the farmer uses his wife as well as the swine.) See also the Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, E text (Type C) which was recited as a story outline, the exact words of the song having been forgotten.
Beck, Sgs Mich Lmjks, 107 prints a text from the woodsmen that substitutes a lumberjack for the farmer, and the Randolph, OzF-S 9 1, 189 version is long, with many added details. Nevertheless, the story matter of both these texts can be said to be Type A. Note that the American stories have a number of varied endings, all, expecting Type D, being in the same mood.
There is something of the sentimental in Type D.
The American refrains are whistles, as in Child A, and/or nonsense lines of the "sing fol-roll dolli", etc. sort.
Belden, Mo F-S, 95 expresses the belief that the devils dancing on a wire, as they do in Missouri and Nova Scotia, may hark back to the mystery plays.
279. THE JOLLY BEGGAR
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 333, 475 (trace) / Cox, Trd Bid W Va., 50 / Davis, FS Va / Goose Hangs High Songster (deWitt, Philadelphia, 1866) / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 194 / John Templeton, "Jolly Beggar" (Oliver Ditson, Boston, n. d.).
Local Titles: The Beggar's Bride.
Story Types: A: A man gives lodging to a beggar who then runs off with his daughter. When the parents find the girl gone, they swear they will never take in another beggar. Seven years later the beggar returns, and, upon being told why no more beggars are lodged, he reveals that he is bringing the daughter back, not only full of fine stories, but a gay lady as well.
Examples: Barry.
Discussion: Child 279 survives in America in a derivative form. The Jolly Beggar (see also The Beggar Laddie, Child 280) was published, revised, as The Gaberlunyie-Man in the 1724 Tea-Table Miscellany by Allan Ramsay. See Child V, 115, where the fact that both songs were traditionally ascribed to James the Fifth of Scotland is stated. Some texts of the derivative have been discovered in this country, but the song is not common over here. The California (Cox, Trd Bid W Va) and Missouri-Arkansas (Randolph, Oz F-S,) fragments have two stanzas that correspond to the Maine (Barry, Br it Bids Me] text, and Barry, JAFL, XXII, 79 notes a tune from New Hampshire. The Barry version reflects the American tendency to omit the lustier parts of a story. Compare also Child's Jolly Beggar in this respect,
281. THE KREACH I THE CREEL
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 336.
Local Titles: The Kreach i' the Creel.
Story Types: None.
Discussion: The story of the ballad in Child is that of a young maid who captivates a clerk. To win her from her parents' strict watch, the hopeful lover has his brother build him a ladder, enters the locked house in a basket let down the chimney, and gets in bed with the daughter. Investigation by the father and mother are thwarted by the girl's telling her father that she is praying with a large book in her arms and by the mother's falling in the basket and being pulled up and down the flue by the clerk's brother.
Barry, Brit Bids Me, Maine text is a fragment, and it tells only of the bump the wife gets in the basket. The stanza follows Child D in the use of the word "lum" instead of "chimney". Herbert Halpert is now in possession of a more complete text.
283. THE CRAFTY FARMER
Texts: The Crafty Farmer; Barry, Brit Bids Me, 477 (trace) / Cox, F-S South, 166. The Yorkshire Bite: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 406 / Brown Coll / Combs, F-S Etats-Unis, 149 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 29 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Ft, 26 / Flanders, New On Mt Sgstr, 97 / Flanders, Vt F-S Blds : 234 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Micb, 382 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 46 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 135 / JAFL, XXIII, 451 ; XXX, 3675 XLV, 30 / Sandburg, Am Sgbag 118.
The Maid of Rygate; Greenleaf and Manfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 47.
Local Titles: None given.
Jack and the Highwayman, John Sold the Cow Well, Robber Song, Selling the Cow, The Crafty Ploughboy, The London Mason, The New Hampshire Bite, The Yorkshire Bite, The (Little) Yorkshire Boy, The Highway Robber.
Story Types: A: The Crafty Farmer. A fanner is going to pay His rent when a gentleman thief overtakes him. As they ride along, the farmer, through conversation, reveals the large amount of money that he is carrying on him. He even reveals the hiding-place of the money in his saddle-bags, The thief then pulls a pistol. However, the fanner throws an old saddle-bag over a hedge and, when the robber goes after this decoy, rides off upon the culprit's horse. The desperate thief offers to split fifty-fifty with the farmer, if the latter will only come back. This proposition is ignored, and the farmer goes to the landlord, pays his rent, and finds a lot more money in the robber's portmanteau. On his way home, the farmer finds his own horse tied to a tree. At home, his wife runs about the house in glee when she hears the news.
Examples: Cox.
B: The Torkshire Bite: A boy is robbed after having sold a cow in town for a farmer. The thief had overheard the lad ask for advice as to where to hide the money and had watched a tavern barmaid sew the cash in his coat-lining. Instead of giving the thief the money, the boy spreads it on the grass. When the robber dismounts to pick it up, the lad rides off on the thief's horse. He and the farmer split the loot stored in the robber's saddle-bags, keep the horse, and rejoice. In some texts, the farmer is so happy he gives the boy his daughter as a wife.
Examples: Barry (A): Greenleaf and Mansfield, p. 46; Combs.
C: Mail of Rygate: Here, a heroine, stripped naked and robbed by a bandit, rides off astraddle his horse. She is on her way home from market with gold for her father who has sold some land. As in the other songs, she finds a fortune among the thief's possessions.
Examples: Greenleaf and Mansfield, p. 47.
Discussion: The Crafty Farmer itself is rare indeed in America. Cox, F-S South, prints a West Virginia text that is almost identical to Child A, although there are eight additional lines in the American text that do not affect the story and a rearrangement of stanzas in the final stages of the song. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 477 notes that the same text was recognized by a Maine sea-captain as a song his sailors used to sing.
The usual ballads of a duped thief belong, in America, to the Yorkskire Bite series. See Logan's Pedlar's Pack, 131. This song (1769) is older in print than The Crafty Farmer (1796), and both are members of a large group of similar tales. See Child, V, 129. See also Greenleaf and Mansfield, Blds Sea Sgs Newfdld, 47 where an American version of The Maid of Rygate (Logan's
Pedlar's Pack, 133) is printed under the title The Highway Robber.
For a detailed discussion of The Yorkshire Bite and for an anecdote that runs parallel to The Crafty Farmer, see JAFL, XXIII, 45 iff. A bite is a shrewd trick played on a person in this case like those tricks for which the people of Yorkshire are famous. There are also Kennebec, South Carolina, and New Hampshire bites mentioned in this country. See NTFLQ, IV, 179 and Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 97. The American refrains are nonsense lines.
285. THE GEORGE ALOE AND THE SWEEPSTAKE
Texts: George Aloe: JAFL, XVIII, 134 / Shay, Deep Sea Chanties, 58.
Coast of Barbary Examples : American Songster (Cozzens, N.Y.) / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 4.13 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 51 / Colcord, Roll and Go, 78 / Colcord, Sgs Am Sailormen, 153 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 229 / Forget-me-not Songster (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia and N.Y., c. 1840) / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 212 / Morris, F-S Flo,, 91 / Nesser, Aw Naval Sgs Bids, 303 / Shay, Am Sea Sgs Chanties, 91 / Shay, Deep Sea Chanties, 98 / Shay, My Ptotts Frnds Drkn Cmpns, 140 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 66.
Local Titles: The George Aloe and the Sweepstake.
Story Types: A: Two merchant ships, the Aloe and the Sweepstake ', are sailing by Barbary. The Aloe anchors, but the Sweepstake goes on and is attacked and boarded by a French man o' war. When those aboard the Aloe hear this, they sail out to meet the Frenchmen. They sight the enemy.
Examples: Shay.
B : A man o 5 war (originally she was a merchant ship) out cruising sights a frigate and, on hailing her, learns that she is a privateer (originally she was a French man o' war). A battle ensues, and the man o' war shoots the pirate's mast away. The robber calls for mercy, but none is shown.
Examples: JAFL, XVIII, 134.
Discussion: The American Types A and B, if placed together, give the complete story of the ballad. However, the Type B text has been changed to the extent that the merchantman and French man o' war have become a man o' war and a privateer respectively. As this version was collected from a United States Navy sailor and is of Civil War vintage, the change is understandable. See Child, V, 133 for his outline of the narrative and a discussion of a possible second part to the English ballad.
There are many American versions of a derivative of Child 285 that go under a variation of a Coast of Barbary title. These tell of a sea-fight between a privateer and a victorious man o' war (a feature that may account for the switch noted above in Type B) and trace back to a song based on the ballad and written for the British Navy by Charles Dibden (1745 1814). Little except the alternating refrain and the phrase "coast of Barbary" is retained of the Child song, however. Versions are found along the sea-coast. See Colcord's discoveries from New Bedford and Lomax's text from West Bermuda.
286. THE SWEET TRINITY (THE GOLDEN VANITY)
Texts: Anderson, Coll Bids Sgs, 53 / Barry, Brit Bids Me, 339 / Belden, Mo F-S, 97 / Berea Quarterly, XVIII, 18 / Bowles, Am F-S / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, r 58 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, V, 10 / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn Va Mt Bids, 93 / Calmer, Am Sings, 185 / Chappell, F-S' Rnke Alb, 43 / Colcord, Roll and Go, 79 / Colcord, Sgs Am Sailormen, 154 / Coleman and Bregman, Sgs Am Flk, 16 / Cox, F-S South, 169 / Cox, Trd Bid W Va, 52 / Cox, W. Va. School Journal and Educator, XLV, 58 / Creighton, Sgs Bids N Sc, 20 / Davis^ Trd Bid Va, 516 / Duncan, No Hamilton Cnty, in / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Vt, 40 / Flanders F' F-S Bids,
230 / Focus^ IV, *5$ / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sea Sgs So Mich, 214 / Greenleaf and Mansfield, Bids Sea Sgs Newfdld, 43 / Harper's Mgz (May, 1 915), 912 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 127 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 125 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #22 / Hummel, Os F-S / JAFL, XVIII, 125; XXIII, 381, 4295 XXX> 33M XLV, 25; XLVIII, 3125 LII, n / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 210 / Macintosh, So III F-S, 21 / McDonald, Selctd F-S Mo, 17 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 97 / Minish Mss / Morris, F-S Fla, 476 / Musical Quarterly, III, 374 / Niles, Anglo Am Bid Sidy Bk, 28 / Niles, Bids Lv Sgs Tgc Lgds, 18 / Ozark Life, VI, # i /
Perry, Carter Cnty, 197 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 24 / Raine, Land Sddle Bags, 121 / Randolph, Oz F-Sj I, 195 / Randolph, The Ozarks, 177 / Richardson, Am Mt Sgs, 28 / Elizabeth M. Roberts, The Great Meadow, N.Y., 1930, 34 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 184 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #35 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 282 / Shearin and Combs, Ky Syllabus, 9 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 132, 299 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly, 126 / Singer's Journd, II, 686 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anth Old Wrld Bids, 59 / SFLQ, II, 79 / Va FLS Bidl, s 3, 4, 8 10 / Wyman and Brockway, Lnsme Tunes, 72.
Local Titles: A Ship Set Sail for North America, Gold China Tree, Golden Vallady, Low Down Lonesome Low, Merry (Mary) Golden Tree, Sailing in the Lowlands Low, Sinking in the Lowlands Low, The Cruise in the Lowlands Low, The French Galilee, The Gold China Tree, The Golden Merrilee, The Golden Vanity, The Golden Willow Tree, The Green Willow Tree, The Little Cabin Boy, The Little Ship, The Lonesome Low, The Lonesome Sea, The Lowlands, The Lowland Sea, The Lowlands Low, The Pirate Ship, The Turkey-rogherlee and the Yellow Golden Tree, The Turkey Shivaree, The Weep-willow Tree.
Story Types: A: A boat is sailing in the lowlands when attacked by a feared pirate. A cabin boy volunteers to sink the robbers. As a reward, he is to get money and the hand of the captain's daughter. He accomplishes his task by swimming to the other ship and cutting some gashes in her. The pirate goes down. When the boy has swum back to his ship, the captain refuses to keep his word. Out of respect for his mates or the girl, the boy reluctantly does not sink the captain's boat. He either dies of exhaustion in the water or in a hammock on deck after his mates hoist him aboard.
Examples: Barry (A), Davis (A), SharpK (A).
B: The story is the same as that of Type A. However, the cabin boy is rescued by his shipmates. He scorns the gold and fee, but accepts the girl's hand in marriage. Examples: JAFL; XVIII, 125.
C: The story is identical to that of Type A. However, the ghost of the boy returns to haunt the captain or the Lowlands.
Examples: Belden (A), Coleman and Bregman.
D: The usual story is told. But, after the boy drowns, the crew throws the captain overboard and drowns him.
Examples: Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, p. 132.
E : The usual story is told. However, the boy swears that he will sink the captain, too. Examples : Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, p. 299.
Discussion: The American versions of this song should not be confused with the later Lowlands Low group (Toung Edmund) which traces back to the English Toung Edwin in the Lowlands Low series.
The Sweet Trinity in this country does not really follow any of the Child versions textually, although there is on the whole a closer resemblance to Child B and C than to Child A. In America, Sir Walter Raleigh is no longer connected with the song, the ships have "Golden Vanity" and "Turkish (also Russian, Irish, French, etc.) Revelee" names which may vary with historical circumstances, and a more positive ending.
The New World story types differ with respect to the conclusion only, Type A resembles Child A (though in a more definite form) and/or Child C, but cannot be said to parallel either. The gallant refusal by the cabin boy to follow his inclinations to sink the captain's ship is only in America. Type B seems definitely derived from Child B, but also is more definite, while Types
C, D, and E reflect the desire for justice to be done, and in the case of Type E for revenge as well. Colcord, Roll and Go, 79 and JAFL, XVIII, 125 reflect the American tendency to sentimentalize.
The Colcord, SgsAmSailormen, 154 text contains a great deal of sea lingo, while the Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 130, B version finds the Golden Willow Tree sunk by a lad from the Turkish Revelee. Note also BFSSNE, V, n in the text printed there the boy "upsets the tea-kettle and drowns all the mice".
Barry, Brit Bids Me, 347 points out that the similarity between the southern and New England versions of this ballad indicates that the height of the song's popularity in England was at the time of the big American emigration.
For a parody of the song, see Sandburg, Am Sgbag, 343. For other college versions, note The American College Songster (Ann Arbor, Mich., 1876), 101; Waite's Carmina Collegensia (Boston, cop. 1868), 171; and White's Student Life in Song (Boston, cop. 1879), 58.
287. CAPTAIN WARD AND THE RAINBOW
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 347 / Broadsides: Coverly, Bostoa Public Library; Harvard University Library 25242.5.5, 25276.4381 / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 45 / Flanders, Vt F-S Elds, 242 / Forecastle Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N.Y., 1849) / Forget-me-not Songster (Locke, Boston, c. 1842) / Forget-me-not Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N.Y.), 41 / Forget-me-not Songster (Turner and Fisher, Philadelphia), 200 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sg$ So Mich, 216 / Green Mountain Songster, 56 / JAFL, XVIII, 137; XXV, 177 / Pearl Songster (Huestis, N.Y., .1846), 136 / Shoemaker, Mt Mnstly, 300 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtchs, 33.
Local Titles; Captain Ward, Captain Ward and the Rainbow, Captain Ward the Pirate
Story Types: A: The English king has a ship, the Rainbow, built and sent out to sea. She encounters the Scot, Captain Ward, who, upon being recognized as a pirate who had robbed the English and ordered to surrender, fights her and routs her with the taunt that the king can rule the land, but Ward rules the sea.
Examples: Barry (B), Gardner and dickering. Shoemaker.
B: The Scotsman Ward writes the English King and requests that he be taken into the Royal Navy with his ship for 10,000 of gold. The King (or Queen) refuses him as being untrustworthy. Ward sets off again, undismayed, and robs, among others, an English merchantman. When the news reaches the King, he has the Rainbow built. This boat attacks Ward, captures him, and takes him back to England. Ward speaks right up to the King and says that he hates France and Spain and has robbed but three English ships. Nevertheless, he is hung.
Examples: Barry (C).
C: The story is similar to that of Type B. However, after losing the fight, the Rainbow returns to the King and tells him Ward will never be taken, and the monarch bewails the three great men he has recently lost. They would have captured Ward had they been alive.
Examples: Barry (D), Flanders (B).
Discussion: Child, V, 163 dates the events of this ballad as having occurred between 1604 and 1609 and cites John Ward of Kent as the hero. The deaths of Essex, Clifford, and Mountjoy in 1601, 1605 and 1606 respectively tend to back up these statements. They are the three heroes who would have taken Ward had they been alive. Barry, Brit Bids Me, 358 63, in a difficult, but informative discussion, investigates the British and American versions of the story in detail.
From his arguments, it seems very possible that the Type B ballads give the end of the story as it occurred in actuality and that, although Ward escaped once, he was later captured by other men in James* service and hung. The Type A and C texts do not reveal these subsequent events and only tell of the escape Type A, the most common of the three in America, being a shorter version of the Type C (Child) story. If this reasoning is true, then the name the Rainbow has been confused and appears both on James' defeated ship (A, C) and on his victorious ship (B). However, it is equally possible that a tragic ending and a happy ending exist on the same ballad because of folk whim, contact with Sir Andrew Barton (see my discussion under Child 167, as well as Barry, op. cit., 253ff.) or another reason.
The savage opening stanza of the Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 45 text is worth note. In it, the King calls Ward a "wanton, lying, stinking thief".
289. THE MERMAID
Texts; Barry, Brit Bids Me, 363 / Belden, Mo F-S, 101 / Botkin, Am Play-Party Sg, 56 / Botkin, Treasry NE F-L, 872 / Brown Coll / Chappell, F-S Rnke Alb, 47 / Cox, F-S South, 192 / Davis, Tr d Bid Va, 521 / DeMarsan Broadside List 14, 4 56 / Deming Broadside (Boston, c. 1838) / Focus, III, 447; IV, 97 / Forget-me-not Songster (Locke, Boston, c. 1842) I Forget-me-not Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N.Y.), 79 / Forget-me-not Songster (Sadlier, N.Y.), 46 / Forecastle Songster (Nafis and Cornish, N.Y., 1849), 112 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 112 / Heart Songs, 360 / Henry, F-S So Hgblds, 133 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 127 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #23 / JAFL, XVIII, 136; XXV, 176; XXVI, 175 / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 151 / Luce's Naval Songs, 1 902, 1 1 8 / MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 65 / McGill, F-S Ky Mts, 46 / Morris, F-S Fla, 479 / Musick, F-L Kirksville, 12 / NTFLQ, IV, 179 / Pearl Songster (Huestis, N.Y., 1846), 155 / Pound, Am Bids Sgs, 26 / Pound, Nebr Syllabus, 10 / PTFLS, X, 162 / Randolph, OzF-S, I, 202 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 189 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplchns, I, 291 / Shoemaker, No Pa Mnstly (1919), 157 / Singer's Journal, I, 301 / Spaeth, Read 'em and Weep, 81 / Stout, F-L la, 14 / Thompson, Bdy Bts Brtcbs, 216 / Uncle Sam's Naval and Patriotic Songster (Cozzens, N. Y.), 40 / Pa FLS Bull #s 2 5, 8 10 / Alfred Williams, Street Bids and Sgs (pre- 1895).
Local Titles: As I Sailed Out One Friday Night, Our Gallant Ship, The Mermaid, The Royal George, The Shipwrecked Sailors, The Sinking Ship, The Stormy Winds, The Stormy Winds How They Blow (Do Blow), The Three Sailor Boys, The Wreck.
Story Types: A: A ship sets sail on a Friday, a day of ill-omen. It sights a mermaid at sea, a fact which bodes ill-weather. The men on board all resign themselves that the ship will go down. It does.
Examples: Barry (A), Belden, Davis (A).
B : The story Is the same as that of Type A. However, the captain "plumbs" the sea fore and aft and realizes the boat will sink and that all the men on board will be in Heaven or Hell "this night". The other crew members do not appear. Examples: Lomax and Lomax.
Discussion: The Type A American texts of this song follow the Child B-D series rather closely, although the first stanza of the JAFL, XXVI, 175 fragmentary song allies it with Child A. A man lies in bed thinking of the hard life of the sailors. This version does not mention the mermaid, however, although she may have appeared in one of the forgotten stanzas. The Type B version has no parallel in Child and probably has resulted from gradual degeneration through transmission, or from print.
The ballad has been included in many published works both in Britain (see Cox, F-S South, 172) and in America. Cox, op. cit. 9 and MacKenzie, Bids Sea Sgs N Sc, 65 give lists of college songbook texts. Some references of this sort are The American College Songster (Ann Arbor, 1876), 56; Noble's Songs of Harvard (cop. 1913), 82; W. H. Hill's Student's Songs, 27; and
Wake's Student Life in Song (Boston, cop. 1879), 47. It has been parodied frequently. See Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 190; The Slam-Bang Songster (cop. 1870), 8; and The We Won't Go Home Until Morning Songster (cop. 1869), 8. For its use as a children's game see Gomme, Traditional Games, pp 143, 422; For its use as a play-party game see Botkin, Am Play-Party Sg y 56. For other published texts, which have had a large influence on the form of this song, see the broadside and songster references included in the bibliography above.
American texts usually have a "stormy winds" chorus which will vary in position and use in the different versions and variants.
293. JOHN OF HAZELGREEN
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 369 / BFSSNE, III, 9 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 529 / MLN, XLVI, 304 / Morris, F-S Fla, 482 / Scarborough, Sgctchr So Mts, 225 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, I, 294 / Smith and Rufty, Am Anib Old Wrld JBlds, 62 / SFLQ, XIII, 173 / Va FLS Bull, 4s 3-7, 10.
Local Titles: John (Jack, Jock) o' Hazelgreen, John of (over) Hazelgreen, Willie of Hazel Green.
Story Types: A: A walker discovers a girl crying, and he offers her his eldest son in marriage. However, she refuses, saying that she loves John of Hazelgreen, whom she describes glowingly. She then rides to town and is met by John, who kisses her and promises fidelity. Examples : Davis (A), SharpK.
B : The story is parallel to that of Type A, except that instead of going to town the girl rides home with the walker after she has refused the offer of his son's hand. At the house she is met by her Willie, who conveniently turns out to be the son. Examples: SFSSNE, III, 9.
Discussion: The full story of the ballad as given by Child, V, 160 is as follows:
A gentleman overhears a damsel making moan for Sir John of Hazelgreen. After some compliment on his part, and some slight information on hers, he tells her that Hazelgreen is married; then there is nothing for her to do, she says, but to hold her
peace and die for him. The gentleman proposes that she shall let Hazelgreen go, marry his eldest son, and be made a gay lady 5 she is too mean a maid for that, and, anyway, had rather die for the object of her affection. Still she allows the gentleman to take her up behind him on his horse and to buy clothes for her at Biggar, though all the time dropping tears for Hazelgreen. After shopping they mount again, and at last they come to the gentleman's place, when the son runs out to welcome his father. The son is young Hazelgreen, who takes the maid in his arms and kisses off the still-failing tears. The father declares that the two shall be married the next day, and the young man shall have the family lands.
The Type B version cited here, although obviously a fragment of the same story, does not follow any Child version. The Type A stories are not close to Child's version either and frequently in America appear little more than a maid's lament and a lover's reunion.
The Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 536, J, version has been the subject of some scholarship because of the influence that Scott's Jock of Hazeldean has had upon it. For a discussion of the role played by Scott in the composition of the English text in the light of this Virginia version, see Maurice Kelley's article, MLN, XLVI, 304. Check also Davis, op. cit. 9 529 and Morris, F-S Fla, 482. See BFSSNE, III, 9 where a New Brunswick song that corrupts Scott's poem with lines from the traditional ballad is printed. Scott's poem and its history are fully treated here. There is no clear story to be seen in this fragmentary Canadian version, however.
295. THE BROWN GIRL
Note: Reed Smith (SFLQ, I, #2, 9 1 1) lists The Brown Girl in its traditional form among the survivals of Child ballads in America. I have not, however, been able to locate a published text.
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 418 / Belden, Mo F-S, in / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 164 / Broadsides: Claude L. Fraser Coll., Yale University; Brown University Library / Brown Coll / Cambiaire, Ea Tenn Wstn 7 a Mt Bids, 1 19 / Cox, F-S South, 366 / Davis, Trd Bid Fa, 537 / Flanders, Vt F-S Bids, 244 / Gardner and Chickering, Bids Sgs So Mich, 150 / Green Mountain Songster, 23 / Haun, Cocke Cnty, 83 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 134 / Hudson, F-S Miss, 128 / Hudson, F-T Miss, 8 / Hudson, Spec Miss F-L, #25 / JAFL, XXVII, 73; XXXII, 502; XXXIX, 1 10 ; XLV, 53; LII, 12 / Leach-Beck Mss / Lomax and Lomax, Our Sgng Cntry, 160 / Morris, F-S Fla, 483 / Owens, Studies Tex F-S, 18 / Powell, 5 Va F-S, g / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 205 / Scarborough, Sgctcbr So Mts, 97 / SharpC, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, #36 / SharpK, EngF-S So Aplcbns, I, 295 / Smith and Rufty, Am Antb Old WrU Bids, 67 /
Local Titles: A Brave Irish Lady, A Irish (Young) Lady, Doctor, Fair (Pretty) Sally, Love Billie, Sally and Her True Love Billie, Pretty Sally of London, Rose of Ardeen, Sally, Sallie, (Pretty) Sally and Billy, Sally Sailsworth, The Bold Sailor, The Brown Girl, The Fair Damsel (Rich Lady) from London, The Rich (Irish) Lady, The Royal Fair Damsel, The Sailor from Dover, There Was a Young Lady.
Story Types: A: A young girl, once attached to a man, tells him she cannot love him as she has fallen for another. He becomes proud. Later, when she falls deathly ill, she sends for the scorned one and requests that he restore her faith and love. He arrives and mocks her situation, reminds her how she scorned him, and says he will dance with glee on her grave. Often, she
gives him a ring to wear while dancing on her grave, a gift which he scorns.
Examples: Brewster, Davis (A), SharpK (A).
B: See The Death of Queen Jane (Child 170): Type D.
Examples: Davis, p. 420; SharpK, p. 303,
C: The story is like that of Type A, except that the man repents his cruelty and says he will soon die and wed the girl in death.
Examples: SharpK (G).
D: The same story is told as was told in Type A, but the ending is happy. The lover repents and tells the girl to "cheer up". He then marries her.
Examples: Barry (A, E), Gardner and Chickering, Flanders.
E : The story is the same as that of Type A, but it is the man who gets ill and the girl (like Barbara Allen) who goes to see him, scorns him a second time, and is given the rings to wear when she dances on his grave. Examples: JAFL, LII, 12.
F: The story is very like that of Type A. However, the man spurns the girl at the start by telling her that he will only marry her if forced. She then becomes proud, gets ill, and sends for him. He spurns her again in the usual fashion. Examples: Leach-Beck Mss.
G: A degeneration exists in which a sea-captain, Pretty Polly, and Miss Betsy are involved in a confusion in which the "are you the doctor" stanzas are the only intelligible part.
Examples: JAFL, XLV, 54.
Discussion: The American forms of this ballad can all (excepting Smith's find, if that find is genuine) be traced back to English derivatives of the Child song that went under titles such as Sally and Billy and The Bold Soldier. In this country, the girl is no longer brown, the sexes have been reversed so that the lover mocks and scorns the dying girl, and the "are you the doctor" stanzas have become a central feature of the ballad. See Belden, Mo F-S, in for a detailed discussion of the American and British features of the song.
There has been a certain amount of doubt and hesitation among the collector-editors in deciding whether or not to include the American Brown Girl as part of the Child 295 tradition or not. Barry and Gardner and Ctickering publish their finds as secondary versions of the traditional song, while Randolph, Brewster, Sharp-Karpeles, and Davis include theirs as American
variants. See Hudson, F-S Miss, 128; the Kirklands, SFLQ, III, 79; and Powell, 5 Va F-S, 78 for discussions of the problem.
The story of The Brown Girl, as given by Child, V, 166, is as follows: A young man who has been attached to a girl sends her word by letter that he cannot fancy her because she is so brown (he has left her for another). She sends a disdainful reply. He writes again that he is dangerously ill (he is lovesick), and begs her to come to him quickly and give him hack his faith. She takes her time in going, and when she comes to the sick man's bedside, cannot stand for laughing. She has, however, brought a white wand with her, which she strokes on his breast, in sign that she gives him back the faith which he had given her. But as to forgiving and forgetting, that she will never do ; she will dance upon his grave.
The American story types are, of course, quite dissimilar to this narrative. Type A is the normal American tale. The Type B variation is due to the corruption of Child 170, The Death of Queen Jane (See Type D under 170). Types C and D reflect different degrees of sentimentality and, particularly in the latter case, weaken the story considerably. Type E is interesting in
that the sexes reverse back to the British form, although the girl remains the scorner at the start. Part of this story was narrated, and the change may be due in some degree to faulty memory. Type F echoes the British Brown Girl also in that the man spurns the girl before she becomes haughty. However, this text is clearly the derivative song, and the variation is probably connected to the fact that some of the verses were unknown to the singer. Type G is a most unbelievably confused and garbled text.
The SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplchns, F text should be noted in that it reveals the "doctor" stanzas taken so literally that the lover has become a physician. See also Powell, 5 Va F-S.
299. THE TROOPER AND THE MAID
Texts: Barry, Brit Bids Me, 371 / Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 166 / Brown Coll / BFSSNE, VIII, 11 / Davis, Trd Bid Va, 544 / Focus, V, 280 / Randolph, Oz F-S, I, 213 / Randolph, Oz MtFlk, 209 / Sewanee Review (July 1911), 326 / SharpC, EngF-S So Aplcbns # 37 / SharpK, Eng F-S So Aplcbns, 305 / Va FLS Bull #s 4, 7, 8.
Local Titles: A Soldier Rode from the East, The Bugle Boy, The Trooper, The Trooper and the Maid.
Story Types: A: A trooper comes to his mistress' house to spend the night with her. After feeding the horse and feasting, they go to bed and are awakened by a trumpet in the morning. The trooper has to leave; the girl fearing she has been ruined follows him. He begs her to turn back. She asks him repeatedly when they are to meet and marry. He replies with a typical
ballad "never, never" motif, such as that used in Edward, The Two Brothers, etc.
Examples: Davis (A, B), SharpK (A, C).
B: The story is much like that of Type A. However, the trooper says he will return to the girl, though marriage is not mentioned.
Examples: Barry.
C: The story is similar to that of Type A, but the trooper says he will marry the girl in the future.
Examples: Randolph, OzF-S, I.
D: A version, badly corrupted by Young Hunting, in which the lady stabs the trooper as he bends from his horse after telling her he will never marry her, exists in Indiana. In this text, the girl also persuades the man to spend the night with her after he has told her he is on his way to see his real love.
Examples : Brewster.
Discussion: The American Type A stories follow Child's summary as given in V, 172. Type B, however, as does the Greig, Last Leaves Trd Bid, B, version (see his Note 107 on p. 278), begins to show a modification of the realistic ending. Here the mention of the marriage is left out, but an intention to return is expressed. The Barry, Brit Bids Me, B text, it should be noted, is similar to Greig A (p. 246) expect for this one final stanza where the idea of the return is given: "But, bonnie lassie, I'll lie near ee yet". This final stanza may be a variation from the second stanza (which is repeated in Greig A) with influence from the Greig B ending. Type C carries the tendency to its ultimate conclusion in an ending where the trooper replies that he'll marry the girl "when peace is made an 3 the soldiers are at home" instead of the usual "when cockle shells grow silver bells", etc. Whether this ending has been affected by the Pretty Peggy of Gibb Ms., #13, p. 53 or The Dragoon and Peggy of Maidment's Scotish Ballads and Songs (1859), 98 which Child, V, 172 notes end happily is hard to say. Type D demonstrates
the manner in which a new song can grow from two old ones. Brewster, Bids Sgs Ind, 166 points out that his text contains a half-stanza from the Manx Va shiaulteyr voish y twoiae (JFSS, VII, 216).