Lady Gay- N. Fitzgerald (VA) 1918 Sharp M
[My title, replacing the generic Child title. Single stanza w/music from Cecil Sharp; English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians; Sharp/Karpeles I; 1932. The 1932 Edition notes follow.
Sharp collected at least three version from the Fitzgerald family (See versions from MS). Philander is the brother of Napoleon and the father of Clinton. Additional text from his brother.
See Sharp's diary notes below.
R. Matteson 2015]
No. 22. The Wife of Usher's Well.
Texts without tunes:—Child's English and Scottish Popular Ballads, No. 79. Journal of American Folk-Lore, xiii. 119; xxiii. 429; xxx. 305; xxxix. 96. Cox's Folk Songs of the South, p. 88.
Texts with tunes:—E. M. Leather's Folk-Lore of Herefordshire, p. 198. Davis's Traditional Ballads of Virginia, pp. 278 and 576.
See also The Cruel Mother (No. 10), Tune B. McGill's Folk Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, p. 5. Texts A and B are remarkable in that the children cite the mother's 'proud heart' as the reason that has caused them to 'lie in the cold clay', a motive which is absent from other English and Scottish versions.
Sharp diary 1918 page 147. Friday 24 May 1918 - Beechgrove, Virginia
Called on Napoleon FitzGerald, brother of old Philander, and got some interesting songs from him though he is not the singer that his brother is.
M. [Lady Gay] Sung by Mr. NAPOLEON FITZGERALD at Beechgrove, Va., May 24, 1918
Pentatonic. Mode 2.
1. O there was lady gay
And children she had three.
he sent them away to the north countree
To learn their grammaree.
2. They had not ben gone very long,[1]
Scarcely six months and a day,
Before cold death came hastening along
And stole those babes away.
3. She cried aloud: There's a King in Heaven,
They say He wears a crown.
Pray send me back my babes to-night,
Or in the morning soon.
4. When Christmas time was drawing nigh,
And the nights getting long and cold,
Those pretty little babes- came hastening along
Down to their mother's home.
5. She set the table in the room
And on it spread bread and wine.
Come eat, come drink, my sweet little babes,
Come eat and drink of mine.
6. We do not want Your bread, mother,
Neither do we want Your wine,
For yonder stands our sweet Saviour,
He is always our design.
7. She set her bed all in the back-room,
And on it spread a fine sheet,
And on the top a golden spread,
That the better they might sleep.
8. Rise up, rise up, said the oldest one,
The chickens soon will crow,
And yonder stands our sweet Saviour,
And to him we will go.
9. Rise up, rise up, said the next oldest one,
This night you'll see no more-
Woe be unto this wicked world
And those who dwell below.
10. Place a marble stone at our head, mother,
And cold clay at our feet,
For the tears you have shed for us, mother,
Would wet our winding sheet.
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1. Stanzas 2-10 from his brother Philander's version, which I assume would be nearly the same