Maid and Soldier- (Lon) c.1820 Batchelar broadside
[From Bodleian broadsides online; "Maid and Soldier," T. Batchelar, printer; London, 115 Long Alleyn between 1817 and 1828. This is a reprint of an early unknown broadside from the late 1700s. The first extant print was "Lady and the Soldier" J. Morren in Edinburgh. This is the first revision of the Scottish "Waukrife Mammy," presumably sanitized because of the bawdy text. The addition of the "soldier" and the "moon shines bright and clearly" in this revision possibly comes from the similar "Trooper and the Maid."
There are several extant prints of "Maid and Soldier," all nearly identical and from England.
R. Matteson 2018]
Maid and Soldier
As I did walk along the street,
I was my father’s darling,
A pretty maid there I did meet
Just as the sun was rising.
With my row de dow.
Her shoes were black her stocking white,
The buckles were of silver,
She had a black and rolling eye,
Her hair hung down her shoulders.
Where are you going my pretty maid
Where are you going my honey,
She answer’d me right cheerfully,
Of an errand for my mammy.
How old are you, my pretty maid?
How old are you, my honey?"
She answered me right cheerfully:
"I'm seventeen come Sunday."
Will you marry me, my pretty maid,
Will you marry me, my honey,
With all my heart, kind sir, she said,
But dare not for my mammy.
Come you but to my mammy’s house.
When the moon shines bright and clearly,
I will rise and let you in,
My mammy shall not hear me.
Oh! soldier, will you marry me?
Now is your time or never,
And if you do not marry me,
I am undone forever.
I have a wife and she is my own,
How can I disdain her,
And every town that I go thro',
A girl if I can find her.
I’ll go to bed quite late at night,
Rise early the next morning,
The buglehorn is my delight,
And the oboy [oboe] is my darling.
Of sketches I have got enough.
And money in my pocket,
And what care I for any one,
It's of the girls I’ve got it.