Miller's Two Daughters- Barnett (WV) 1915 Cox B
[From Folk-Songs of the South, John Harrington Cox, 1925. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2014]
THE TWA SISTERS (Child, No. 10)
Three variants of this ballad have been found in West Virginia, two with the title, "The Miller's Two Daughters," and one with no title (cf. Cox, XIV, 159). A tells a complete story in which Johnny Ray loves the younger sister and buys her a gay gold ring and a beaver hat. The elder is jealous and pushes her sister into the stream, in which she floats down to her father's dam and is drowned. He drags her out and robs her. The father is hanged on the gallows and the sister is burned at the stake. B is fragmentary and the story is somewhat confused. There are three or four daughters of an "old lady," in which detail it agrees with C. The gift of the beaver hat is omitted. All three belong to the group represented by Child R, S, U, and Y, as is shown in particular by the refrain, the beaver hat, and the wicked miller. A freak of tradition in A makes him the father of the two sisters, and this relationship is involved in the title of B.
For American texts see Child, 1, 137 (Long Island, New York); Journal, XVIII, 130 (Barry; Rhode Island and Maine); XIX, 233 (Belden; Missouri and Kentucky) ; xxx, 287 (Missouri, Nebraska) ; Campbell and Sharp, No. 4 (North Carolina, Virginia) ; Sharp, Folk-Songs of English Origin Collected in the Appalachian Mountains, 2d Series, p. 18 (same as Campbell and Sharp, No. 4 C, but with stanzas from other variants). For references see Campbell and Sharp, p. 323; Kittredge, Journal, XXX, 286. Add Bulletin, Nos. 6-8.
B. "The Miller's Two Daughters." Contributed by Mr. Wallie Barnett, Leon, Mason County, 1915. He learned it from his mother, who does not remember where she got it.
1 There was an old woman who lived near the seashore,
Bow down;
There was an old lady who lived near the seashore,
Bow and bend to me;
There was an old lady who lived near the seashore,
She had some daughters three or four,
I'll be true to my love,
My love will be true to me.
2 "O sister, O sister, let us walk the seashore,
And watch the boats as they sail o'er."
3 The elder one pushed the younger one o'er,
As they were watching the boats sail o'er.
4 "O sister, O sister, please lend me your hand,
And I will bring you safe to dry land."
5 "I'll neither lend you my hand nor my glove,
For all that you want is my own true love."
6. She drifted down to the miller's dam,
The miller threw out his drifting hook
And brought this lady from the brook.