Little Matty Groves- Baring (MO-AR) 1933 Randolph A
[Fragment from Ozark-Folksongs; Vol. 1 1946 Vance Randolph. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2015]
LITTLE MATHY GROVES
This is the ancient "Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard" ballad (Child, English and, Scottish Popalar Ballads, 1882-1898, No.81) quoted in Beaumont and Fletcher's "Knight of the Burning Pestle" (Act V, scene 3), which was written about 1611. The songis entered to Francis Coules in the Stationers' Registers, June 24, 1630. For American texts see Kittredge
(JAFL 30, 1917, pp. 309-317), Campbell and Sharp (English Folk Songs from the Southern Appctachians, 1917, No. 20), Pound (American Ballads and Songs, 1922, No. 15), Cox (Falk Songs of the South, 1925, pp. 94-95), Smith (South Carolina Ballads, 1928, pp. 125-128), Davis (Traditional Ballads of Virginia, 1929, pp. 289-301), Chappell (Folk-Songs of Roanoke and the
Albemerle. 1939, pp. 29-31), Eddy (Ballads and Songs from Ohio, 1939, pp. 48-51), Gardner (Ballads and Songs of Southern Michigan, 1939, pp. 46-49), Belden (Ballads and Songs, 1940 pp. 57-60), and the Brown collection.
A. Little Matty Groves. Sung by Mrs. Catherine Baring, Joplin, Mo., June 24, 1933. Mrs. Baring had it from her mother, who was reared in the Boston Range of the Arkansas Ozarks.
1. Little Matty Groves he went to the church
And merry may be in the year
Little Matty Groves he went to the church
The holy words to hear.
2. The first come down all dressed in red,
The next come down in green,
The next come down was Lord Arnold's wife,
She was took to be some queen.
A little foot-page . . .
. . . .
He run till he come to the white water side,
An' he bowed upon his breast an' swum.
*****
It's how do you like the bed? says he,
An' how do you like the sheets?
An' how do you like my lady gay
A-layin' in your arms to sleep?
The very first lick little Matty Groves struck
It wounded him deep an' sore,
The very first lick Lord Arnold struck
Little Matty didn't fight no more.
Lord Arnold he taken his other bright sword,
Amongst the quality all,
. . .an' he cut off her head
An' throwed it against the wall.[1]
1. This stanza is taken in part from Child 73- Lord Thomas