The House Carpenter- McClellan (MI) 1935 Gardner A
[From: Ballads and Songs of Southern Michigan by Emelyn Elizabeth Gardner and Geraldine Jencks Chickering, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press London: Humphrey Milford, Oxford University Press: 1939. Their notes follow.
R. Matteson 2013]
10. THE HOUSE CARPENTER
(James Hams; The Daemon Lover, Child, No. 243)
The Michigan texts are most similar to Child B, although there are stanzas in the Child text which are replaced by others in the Michigan forms. (See Child, IV, 360-369.) For texts and references, with a discussion of the song, see Cox, pp. 139-149, and Davis, pp. 439-478. See also Barbour, JAFL, XLIX, 209-211; Barry, Eckstorm, and Smyth, pp. 304-310; Bulletin, VII, n; Eddy, No. 16; Greig, pp. 196-197; Hudson, pp. 19-21; Sandburg, pp. 66-67; Scarborough, pp. 150-159; Sharp, I, 244--258; Smith, pp. 151-155; Stout, pp. 11-13; and Thomas, pp. 172-173. None of these texts has lines similar to stanza 7 of Michigan C, with its premonition of disaster, which is perhaps a slight remnant of superstition.
Version A was sung in 1935 by Mrs. Allan McClellan, near Bad Axe.
1 "We have met, we have met once more, my love,
We have met once more," said he.
"I have just returned from the salt, salt sea,
And it's all for the sake of thee.
2 "All for your sake I've refused golden store,
And houses of high degree.
O the king's only daughter dear
With me she did comply."
3 "If you could have married the king's daughter,
Young man, I think you are to blame,
For I'm married to the house carpenter,
And I think him a fine young man."
4 "O can't you leave your house carpenter
And come along with me?
I'll take you where the grass grows green
On the banks of the sweet Lacolee."
5 "Have you got gold, or have you got store,
Or have you ships at sea?
Or what have you got to maintain me upon
And keep me from slavery?"
6 "Yes, I have gold and I have store,
And I have ships at sea
With a hundred and twenty gallant sailor boys,
And they will wait on me."
7 She went unto her darling little babes
And kissed them one, two, and three,
Saying, "Stay you on with your papa dear
And keep him company."
8 She dressed herself in silks and satins,
And velvet of the best;
And as she walked down the street,
She shone like glittering gold,
9 She had not been on the sea two weeks,
I am sure it was not three,
Before she began to weep and to sigh,
Weeping most bitterly.
10 "O is it for my gold you weep,
Or is it for my store?
Or is it for your two pretty babes
You never shall see any more?"
11 "It is not for your gold I weep,
Nor is it for your store.
It's all for my two pretty babes
I never shall see any more."
12 She had not been on the sea three weeks,
I am sure it was not four;
Before the Albion began for to sink,
And she sank to rise no more.
13 Her sisters cursed the seafaring men,
And cursed be the seaman's life,
For the robbing of the house carpenter,
And the taking away of his wife.