House Carpenter- Ramsey (TN) 1916 Sharp E
[[From: English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians; Comprising 122 Songs and Ballads, and 323 Tunes With Lyrics & sheet Music; Collected by Olive Dame Campbell and Cecil J. Sharp, published 1917. Sharp's No. 29. is titled, The Daemon Lover. I've changed it to the more appropriate title- House Carpenter.
Inexplicably, there is no verse 4, which may just be a numbering problem since Bronson also gives just four stanzas. Following is an excerpt from Mike Yeats', "Jeff Stockton and the Flag Pond singers."
R. Matteson 2013]
Notes: No. 29. The Daemon Lover.
Texts without tunes:—Child, No. 243.
Texts with tunes:—Journal of the Folk-Song Society, iii., 84. Motherwell's Minstrelsy, Appendix xv., tune 1. Songs of the West, 2nd ed., No. 76. American variants: —Journal of American Folk-Lore, xviii., 207; xix., 295; xx., 257; xxvi., 360; xxv., 274 (with tune). Broadside by H. De Marsan, New York. Musical Quarterly, January, 1916, p. 18.
Excerpt from: "Come in, come in …" Jeff Stockton and the Flag Pond singers
Mike Yates
Returning from Higgin's Creek on 1st September, 1916, Sharp and Karpeles called on other singers, such as twenty-one year old Mrs Addy Crane, Sylvaney Ramsey and Mr & Mrs James Gabriel Coates. As I have already written about Mr & Mrs Coates elsewhere I will simply say that they were the people who gave Sharp a version of The False Knight Upon the Road much to Sharp's delight. Sylvaney Ramsey, from Higgin's Creek, provided a tune for the song The True Lover's Farewell and a fuller version of The Daemon Lover. Mrs Addy Crane also gave Sharp a tune for The Daemon Lover as well as tunes for Lord Thomas and Fair Ellinor, Goodbye Sweet Jane, Brisk Young Lover and Awake, Awake. She was also able to give complete versions of The Lily of the West, The Shooting of His Dear, The Rejected Lover and what seems to be a song that was unique to her, called The Discontented Husband.
House Carpenter- Sung by Sylaney Ramsey (TN) 1916 Sharp E
1 Well met, well met my own true love
It's well met, said he.
I have just returned from the State of Tennessee,
And it's all for the love of thee.
2 O who will clothe my little babe,
And who will shoe its feet,
And who will sleep in its lily-white arms
While we're sailing for dry land?
3 Its papa will kiss its little cheek,
And also shoe its feet,
And also sleep in its lily-white arms
While we're sailing for dry land.
5 She picked up her little babe,
And kissed it on the cheek,
She laid it down on a soft bed of down
And bid it go to sleep.