An Ardent Lover- (NC) pre1943 Abrams/ Brown C
[From: The Brown Collection Volume 2, 1952. Their notes follow. The penultimate stanza is reminiscent of "I Will Set My Ship in Order." The last stanza has been found similarly in US versions.
R. Matteson 2016]
71. The Drowsy Sleeper
Familiar both in print and as traditional song on both sides of the water; see BSM 1 18-19, and add to the references there given Virginia (FSV 56-7), North Carolina (FSRA 81-2; a fragment of it sung by Negroes, ANFS 177-8), Florida (SFLQ viii 167-8), Arkansas (OFS i 246), Missouri (OFS i 244-6), Ohio (BSO 92-4), Indiana (BSI 170-4), Michigan (BSSM 86-8), Illinois (JAFL LX 223-4), and Wisconsin (JAFL lii 31). Mrs. Steely found it in the Ebenezer community in Wake county. It is No. 518 in the series of stall ballads printed by Wehnian in New York. For its possible relation to the Gude and Godlie Ballads of 1567, see JEFDSS in 161-4. Very often it is combined, as in version B below, with 'The Silver Dagger,' probably because of the weapon (sometimes specifically a dagger) which the girl tells her lover that her father (or mother) has in readiness against him.
C. 'An Ardent Lover.' Another quite different text from Professor Abrams. It begins with a "bedroom window" stanza :
'Who's that, who's that at my bedroom window
That calls so loud as to wake me up ?'
"Tis he, 'tis he, he's your own true love here,
Here, for your sake, I'm standing here.'
In the ensuing dialogue he is told that her father "holds a reaper To slay the one that breaks his rest," and that her mother "holds a letter From that young man that I love best." Whereupon follow the two concluding stanzas:
'Love, oh, love, she said she wouldn't have me.
I'll sail the ocean till I die.
Then I'll sail away then to the sea
If I can find some girl that will have me.
'Oh, don't you see them clouds rising,
Dark and thick, and thunder roar?
I live in hopes to see some pleasure
Before these clouds does overblow.'