Kentucky Folk-Songs by Hubert G. Shearin
The Modern Language Review, Vol. 6, No. 4 (Oct., 1911), pp. 513-517
HUBERT G. SHEARIN.
LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY, U.S.A.
Versions printed by Bishop Percy, Scott, Professor Child, and other students of British folk-song. These are: 'Barbara Allen's Cruelty,' 'Lady Isabel M. L. R. VI. 33 and the Elf Knight,' 'Earl Brand,' 'The Twa Sisters,' 'The Twa Brothers,' 'Young Hunting,' 'The Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard,' 'The Wife Wrapt in Wether's Skin,' 'The Golden Vanitee,' 'Lord Thomas,' 'The Demon Lover,' 'Lord Level,' 'Sweet William and Lady Margaret,' 'Edward,' ' Lord Randal,' The Jew's Daughter,' 'The Cruel Mother,' 'Lord Bateman' (Beichan), and 'The Bailiff's Daughter of Islington.' Two others may be added, 'Irish Molly O' and 'William Reilley,' which can be seen in the original version in Brooke and Rolleston's Treasury of Irish Poetry.
Seventeen more of these Cumberland Mountain songs, though not to my knowledge preserved in collections like the above, contain British place-names or other unmistakeable evidence of their original composition in the Mother Country. Such signs are the mention of London, London Bridge, St. Pancras, Katherine Street, Newgate, Nottingham, Sheffield, Edinboro, Wexford, and Dublin. And then, too, the occurrence therein of obsolete words and phrases, as 'dinna,' 'good speed,' 'riddle my sport,' 'a month and a day,' 'come her wi',' 'laughen' for 'laughed,' 'hangen' for 'hanged,' 'bailiff,' 'post-town,' ' dever,' from devoir (sb.), to woo, the Northumbrian plural verb for singular, shillings, pounds, and guineas, 'cordelee,' for 'corde-du-laine,' 'denter,' meadow, and 'toise,' prop. My purpose, however, is not to discuss these.. They are mentioned simply because the fact of their existence proves that a strong bond of folk-literature unites the Cumberland Mountain folk of to-day with their European progenitors centuries ago, and thus justifies and explains the analogy now to be exhibited.
My purpose is to present two Eastern Kentucky 'song-ballads,' here printed for the first time, which have an obvious connection with two wellknown literary themes: 'The Red Red Rose,' of Burns, and the 'Glove and Lions' story, as told by Leigh Hunt, Schiller, Browning, and others. In 'Cold Winter's Night' are two stanzas which lie closely parallel to the love-song of the Scottish poet. Below appears the Kentucky ballad in full, with the lines in point italicized:
COLD WINTER'S NIGHT
As I walked out one cold winter night,
And drinking good old wine,
A-thinking of that pretty little girl,
That stole this heart of mine.
And she looks like some pink rose
That blooms in the month of June,
And now she's like some instrument
Been newly put in tune.
I asked your mamma for you, my love;
She said you were too young.
I wish I'd never seen your face,
Or had died when I was young.
Oh, who will shoe your little feet,
And who will glove your hand,
Oh, who will kiss your ruby lips,
While I'm in a foreign land?
Your papa, my dear, will shoe your feet,
And your mamma will glove your hand;
And I will kiss your ruby lips,
When I return again.
Fare you well, my own true love,
Fare you well, for awhile;
If I go away, I'll come again,
If I go ten thousand mile.
If ever I prove false to you,
The elements shall mourn;
If ever I false prove to you,
The sea would rage and burn.
The second analogue lies between another Kentucky folk-song and the Glove and the Lions story, told by Poullain de St Croix in his Essais Historiques sur Paris, and afterward made popular in the poems of Schiller, Leigh Hunt, and Browning. The Cumberland Mountain version locates the event in 'Carolina,' though a variant, perhaps an older one, says 'Carlisle':
[THE LION'S DEN]
Down in Carolina lived a lady,
And she was beautiful and gay;
She was determd (sic) to live a lady,
And no young man should her betray.
Unless he was a man of honor,
A man of honor and of high degree;
At length there came two lovely sailors,
They came this lady for to see.
One he was a bold lieutenant,
A man of honor and of high degree;
The other was a brave sea-captain,
Belonging to a ship named Colonel Call [1].
Then up spoke this fair young lady,
Saying, 'I can be but one man's bride';
Saying, 'You come here to-morrow morning,
And this here question we'll decide.'
Then she called for coach and horses
To be ready at her command;
They rode away, they rode so lovely,
They rode till they came to the lion's den.
[1] Compare the following from 'The Faithful Lover,' in Folk Songs from Somerset, LVI:
The one had a captain's commission
Under command of Colonel Carr;
The other was a lieutenant
On board the Tiger man of war.
There they stopped and there they halted,
While these young men stood ghastly round;
She fell senseless, she fell senseless,
She fell senseless to the ground.
To herself she did recover,
She threw her fan in the lion's den,
Saying, 'Which of you to gain a lady
Will fetch to me my fan again?'
Then up spake this bold lieutenant,
Saying, 'Madam, of this I do not approve;
Madam, I'm a man of honor;
I will not lose my life for love.'
Then up spake this brave sea-captain
Who was there a-standing nigh.
Saying, 'Madam, I'm a man of honor,
I will receive your fan, or die.'
Then down in the cave he boldly entered,
While these lions looked fierce and wild;
He ripped, he raved around amongst them
And returned safe with her fan.
When she saw her love a-coming,
Unto him no harm was done,
She threw herself all in his arms, saying,
' Here is the prize that you have won.'
Then up spake this bold lieutenant,
Just like a man that was troubled in mind,
Saying, 'In these woods I'll always wander,
And not a girl I'll ever find.'
Are these two Kentucky ballads an echo of the literary form, which has filtered into the popular consciousness through school-readers, 'speakers,' and other such media? Or, are they but variants of the very folk-originals seized upon by Burns, Leigh Hunt, and the rest, as the basis of their work? Those deeply versed in ballad-lore-quorum non ego-with access to manuscript collections and broadsides across the water, could perhaps definitely answer the question. The third, fourth and fifth stanzas of 'Cold Winter's Night' are obviously akin to ' The Lass of Lochroyan' (No. 76 in Child); while numerous versions of 'The Lion's Den,' recently current in England, have lately been cited by Professor H. M. Belden, of the University of Missouri, in The Sewanee Review, April, 1911, p. 218, and by Professor G. L. Kittredge, of Harvard University, in Modern Language Notes, 26, 167. As regards the general relation of the popular or vulgar ballad to the literary type, Professor A. H. Tolnan, of the University of Chicago, in a casual letter has recently called my attention to the fact that Scott modelled 'Lochinvar' on 'Katharine Jaffray' (No. 221 in Child), that he built his 'Jock of Hazeldean' upon one stanza of ' John of Hazelgreen' (No. 293 in Child), and that elsewhere his borrowings from folk-songs are more or less easily discernible; also that Burns, as is well known, was, like Scott, very familiar with the ballads, the best version of 'Tam Lin' (No. 39 in Child) being communicated by him.
My personal inclination is therefore toward the second alternative. Should this be some day fully proved, these crude American ballads will deserve recognition among the literary sources of the authors concerned. But whether echo or source, they offer more than a stimulus to the curious student of folk-lore.