Lady Marget [My title]- Sands (NC) 1916 Sharp C
[My title. From: English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians; 1917 Sharp/Campbell and 1932 edition, edited by Karpeles. All of Sharp's versions use the generic title, Fair Margaret and Sweet William. Fair Margaret is not the name that is sung, usually it's Lady (Liddy/Lydia) Margaret (Marget/Margret).
Notes from the 1932 edition follow.
R. Matteson 2012, 2014]
No. 20. Fair Margaret and Sweet William.
Texts without tunes: — Child's English and Scottish Popular Ballads, No. 74. Ashton's Century of Ballads, p. 345. W. R. Mackenzie's Ballads and Sea Songs from Nova Scotia, No. 7. Journal of American Folk-Lore, xix. 281; xxiii. 381; xxviii. 154; xxx. 303.
Texts with tunes : — Christie's Traditional Ballad Airs, i. 117. Journal of the Folk-Song Society, ii. 289; iii. 64. Folk-Songs of England, i, No. 14. Rimbault's Musical Illustrations of Percy's Reliques, pp. 117 and 118. Kidson's Garland of English Folk Songs, p. 30. ChappelPs Popular Music of the Olden Times, i. 382. C. Sharp's English Folk Songs (Selected Edition), ii. 13. Cox's Folk Songs of the South, pp. 65 and 522 (see also further references). Wyman and Brockway's Lonesome Tunes, p. 94. journal of American Folk-Lore, xxxi. 74; xxxv. 340. Musical Quarterly, January 1916. British Ballads from Maine, p. 134. Davis's Traditional Ballads of Virginia, pp. 221 and 570. McGill's Folk Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, p. 71.
[Lady Marget] - Sands (Allansand, NC) 1916 Sharp C
1. As she was sitting in her dower room,
A-combing back her hair,
She saw sweet William and his brown bride,
As they drew near to her.
2 Lady Marget she rose in the dead hour of night
When they'se all a-lying at sleep,
Lady Marget she rose in the dead hour of night
And stood at his bed feet.
3 Says, how do you like your bed? she says,
And how do you like your sheet ?
Or how do you like your brown broden bride
That lays in your arms at sleep?
4 Very well, very well do I like my bed,
But better do I like my sheet,
But better do I like a lady gay
Who stands at my bed feet.
5 Sweet William arose at the dead hour of night
When they was all a-lying at sleep,
Sweet William arose at the dead hour of night
And tingled on the ring.
There was none so ready as her seven brothers
To rise and let him come in.
6 O where is Lady Marget, Lady Marget? he cries,
O where is Lady Marget? says he;
For she's a girl I always did adore
And she stole my heart from me.
7 Is she in her dower room?
Or is she in the hall?
Or is she in her bed chambry
Along with the merry maids all?
8 She is not in her dower room,
Nor neither in the hall,
But she is in her cold, cold coffin
With her pale face toward the wall.
9 And when he pulled the milk-white sheets
That were made of satin so fine:
Ten thousand times you have kissed my lips
And now, love, I'll kiss thine.
10 Three times he kissed her snowy white breast,
Three times he kissed her cheek,
But when he kissed her cold clay lips
His heart was broke within.
11 What will you have at Lady Marget's burying?
Will you have bread and wine ?
Tomorrow morning at eight o'clock
The same shall be had at mine.
12 They buried Lady Marget in our church-yard,
And buried Sweet William by her;
And out of Sweet William's breast sprung a blood-red rose,
And out of Lady Marget's a briar.
13 They grew and grew to the top of the church,
And they could grow no higher,
And they tied a true love's knot
And lived and died together.