Lord Barney- Grubb (VA) 1932 Davis BB
[My footnotes. From: Davis- More TBVa Ballads; 1961. It should not be forgotten that Barry wrote a review in BFSSNE of TBVa, 1929. He took Davis to task on several ballads and the review was in places dismissive of Davis and the book. Davis, who does some bragging about Virginia's wealth of ballads, perhaps deserved this comeuppance. Then, almost 30 years later Davis comments on Barry's "overbold" statements in a respectful way. Note that Davis AA by Bowman (before she married- her last name was Plemmons) edited her version, feeling that "hugging and kissing" was too erotic. Ruby Bowman Plemmons version can be heard on Digital Appalachia - recorded by Kip Lornell.
Two versions of "Love Henry" (Young Hunting; Child 68) from Florida are named Lord Barney.
R. Matteson 2015]
LITTLE MUSGRAVE AND LADY BARNARD
(Child, No. 81)
"Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard" is one of numerous ballads quoted in old plays of the Elizabethan or seventeenth-century periods. Beaumont and Fletcher's "Knight of the Burning Pestle" Act V, Scene 3) contains the earliest (about 1611) quotation from this ballad:
And some they whistled and some they sung,
Hey down, down
And some did loudly say,
Ever as the lord Barnet's horn blew,
Away, Musgrave, away!
Child (II, 243) mentions a number of later seventeenth-century plays in which the ballad is either quoted in part or referred to.
Child prints fifteen versions, some from manuscript, some from broadside or other printed sources. But the ballad does not seem to survive in recent British tradition either in England or in Scotland, according to Miss Dean-Smith's survey or Gavin Greig's Last Leaves. In contrast, it is vigorously alive in American tradition, North, South, and Midwest. Sharp-Karpeles (I, 161-82) print seventeen tunes and texts or part texts from the Southern Appalachians. Barry (pp. 150-94) presents nine texts, some with tunes, from Maine. Belden (pp. 59-60) gives three fragments and two tunes from Missouri. The Brown Collection (II, 101-11, and IV, 53-57) gives five texts and seven tunes from North Carolina, TBVa (pp. 289-301 and 577 prints six of seven texts then available, plus one tune. Subsequently, five new items of the ballad have been recovered in Virginia. Of these, three texts with two tunes are here included. Miss Beckwith has also found the ballad in Jamaica (see PMLA, XXXIX, 455 ff .). Barry (pp. 150-94) has an elaborate discussion of this ballad, both textually and musically. He is perhaps overbold in presenting a number of interesting conjectures about the ballad as if they were established facts, and he is properly modified or corrected on some points by Helen Pettigrew (University of West Virginia Studies, III [Philological Papers II], 8 ff.). Barry is perhaps overhasty in dividing American texts into two types, the Lord Banner type and the Lord Arnold (or Daniel) type, with other differentiating details, in asserting that the split antedates the introduction of the ballad into America, in believing that the American texts are nearer to an earlier and better form than that from which the British texts are drawn, and in identifying the King Henry of the ballad too unequivocally with Henry VIII of England. But one can sympathize with his statement: "The ballad must have been nearly three hundred years in this country, diverging ever farther and farther; but it has never lost its integrity. We note how well the various American texts are preserved; how well they agree; how spirited they are; how splendidly dramatic, when the folk-singer throws himself into the ballad, and we wonder at the virility of a song which can thus keep itself alive. Of all the ballad problems that have come to us, that of 'Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard, seems the finest to solve, should it be capable of any solution." His elaborate grouping of the then (early 1929) known American tunes is ingenious, and we are not inclined to quarrel with his still somewhat speculative conclusion that "the American and British versions of this ballad have come ultimately from a single source, though, if we are to date each by its place in the tradition of the ballad as a whole, the American group, with its fine flavor of unspoiled tradition . . . is not far from a century older than the oldest representative of the British group." The statement makes very clear the importance of collecting these British ballads in America. The American "Little Musgrave" is one of the ballads least spoiled by broadside, songster, or print.
The Virginia texts here presented follow in general Coffin's Story Type A, but with varied inclusions and exclusions.
AA, in which the leading characters are little Massey Grove and Lord and Lady Darnell, begins in church on a high holiday, the very first day of the year-a time and place not specified in either BB or CC. It is a somewhat condensed version, omitting all mention of the warning sent to Lord Darnell and stopping short of the two final killings with their attendant barbarity. The ending is tragic pathos rather than violence. Lord Darnell has gone "on top of the king's mountain, Prince Henry for to see." The tune is a fine one, especially as sung by Miss Bowman.
BB, with Marthyful Globes and Lord and Lady Barney as chief characters, has lost its opening stanzas, but the rest of the story is fully told, with the elaborate exchange between Lord Barney and the little footpage at King Henry's gate, and the full ending in the triple deaths, Lord Barney's barbaric slaying of his unfaithful wife before his own suicide by sword, following his killing of little Matthy in fair fight. There is evidently a euphemism in the line, "This night a bad fellow to be," perhaps representing the singer's effort to clean up what some American folk singers regard as a "dirty" song. (See Randolph, I, 125-25.) Both this text and CC following, but not AA, have tire Lord's two swords "cost me deep in purse," a characteristic expression which marks many American texts.
CC, with the main characters identified as Little Mathie Grove and Lord and Lady Daniel, is one of the fullest of American texts, even though it lacks the churchly opening. The messenger to Lord Daniel is not a little footpage, but "one of Lord Daniel's very best friends" and it may or may not be the same friend who "wishing Mathie Grove no harm" blows the warning bugle blast. Rather incongruously, after killing Little Mathie Grove by stroke of sword, Lord Daniel disposes of his wife and himself by pistol shot- obviously a late variant, possibly imported from some later song of the tragic triangle.
An omitted text identifies the principals as Lord and Lady Banner and Little Jack Grover, names which differentiate Barry's Type One of the ballad, as distinguished from his Type Two, to which AA, BB, and CC all belong. But for the names, the text does not seem to differ significantly from the three here printed, a fact which raises some question as to Barry's criteria of classification. The omitted text is fragmentary and without tune.
The excellent text of R. E. Lee Smith and Thomas P. Smith, also contributed to the Virginia collection, has been omitted because it has already been published in the Brown Collection, II, 102-4, with its tune also, IV, 53.
BB. "Lord Barney." Collected by Miss Alfreda M. Peel, of Salem, Va. Conntributed by Minter Grubb, of Back Creek, Va., Roanoke County. Tune noted by Miss Eloise Kelly, of Marion, Va. 1932.
1. Little footpage was standing by,
A-hearing those words he said,
"Lord Barney shall hear of this here
Before the break of day,
Before the break of day."
2. He run till he came to the bridge broken down,
He hel' his breath an' he swam,
He swam till he come to the other side
And he tied his shoes and he run,
And he tied his shoes and he run.
3. He run till he come to King Henry's gate,
He touched the bell an it rung,
He touched the bell and it rung.
4 "Is any of my castles caught on fire,
Is any of my castles burnt down?"
"There's none of your castles caught on fire,
There's none of your castles burnt down;
Marthyful Globes has gone home with your wife,
This night a bad fellow to be,
This night a bad fellow to be."
5 "If this is the truth you tell unto me,
Which it probably may be
I have but one daughter in this whole round world
And marry to her you shall be,
And marry to her you shall be.
6 "If this be a lie that you tell unto me,
Which I take it to be'
The very first time that I pass by
I'll hang you high as a tree,
I'll hang you high as a tree."
7 He summoned twenty armed men,
He stood them all in a row,
Never a word was they to say
Until the horn did blow,
Until the horn did blow'
8 "Hark, hark, hark, hark," little Marthy said he,
All so round in fear;
"I think that is Lord Barney's horn
That blows so loud and clear,
That blows so loud and clear."
9 "Lie still, lie still, little Marthy," said she,
"Don't You fear at all,
It's nothing but Lord Barney's horn
A-blowin' the sheep to the hall,
A-blowin' the sheep to the hall."
10 He turned her over and give her a kiss,
So lovingly they both fell in to sleep,
And the very first thing little Marthy knowed
Lord Barney was at his feet,
Lord Barney was at his feet.
11. "How do you like my fine feather bed,
How do you like my sheet,
How do you like my beautiful bride,
Lies in Your arms asleep, asleep,
Lies in your arms asleep?"
12 "I like your fine feather bed very well,
Also your sheet,
Much better do I like your beautiful bride
Lies in my arms asleep,
Lies in my arms asleep!"
13 "Rise you up, little Marthy," said he,
"And put you on some clothes,
It never shall be said in King Henry's court
I slain a naked man,
I slain a naked man.
14 "I have two glitterern[1] swords,
They cost me deep in the purse,
You may take the very best one
And I will take the worst,
I will take the worst.
15 "You may strike the very first blow,
And strike it like a man,
And I will strike the very next one,
And kill you if I can,
And kill you if I can."
16 The very first blow little Marthy did make,
He wounded Lord Barney so,[2]
So the very first blow Lord Barney did make,
He killed him dead on the floor.
He killed him dead on the floor.
17 "Rise up, rise up, my beautiful bride,
Sit you down on my knee,
Tell unto me which you like the best
Little Marthyful Globes or me,
Littie Marthyful Globes or me?"
18 "I like you very well," said she,
"And all so your kind.
Much better do I like little Marthvful Globes
Lies on the floor killed,
Lies on the floor killed."
19 He took her by the hair of her head,
And jerked her all over the floor,
He tore her into ten thousand pieces
As he did little Marthy before,
As he did little Marthy before.
20 He put a sword against the wall
The sharp was against his breast,
Saying, "Fare you well, my merry men all,
I'm going home to rest,
I'm going home to rest."
1. glittering
2. sore