Betsy Williams- Kathleen Williams (Glou) 1921 Sharp
[My title, originally: Brisk young Lover. Six stanzas with music from Cecil Sharp Manuscript Collection (at Clare College, Cambridge) (CJS2/9/3338). Roud has the title wrong, calling it Bessie Watson, a title from Roud 1493.
The first stanza is from a different yet similar song (Roud 1493) which Sharp called "Betsy Watson." All the other stanzas are Brisk Young Lover, Roud 60.
R. Matteson 2017]
[Betsy Williams] sung by Kathleen Williams of Wigpool Common, Gloucestershire on 6 September, 1921. Collector: Cecil J. Sharp
O Miss Betsy Williams it is my name,
O I brought myself unto grief and shame
By loving a a young man that never loved me,
O it's sorrow now then I plainly see.
O there is an ale-house in yonders town,
Where my true love goes sits him down;
O he takes a strange girl all on his knee,
O don't you think that's a grief to me?
A grief a grief to me, I'll tell you for why,
O because that girl's got more gold than I;
Her gold will waste, her beauty fade,
Poor girl she'll come down like me at last.
O when I wore my apron low,
I wish I wish but it's all in vain
O there's a bird all on yonders tree