Minor Groups- Tearful Themes
C. Tearful Themes
83. The Bride's Farewell 180
84. The Watcher 182
85. Mary of the Wild Moor 183
C. Tearful Themes
Unhappy young women have lived in all ages to furnish
subjects for songs, but the nineteenth century, heir of the
sentimental movement in the eighteenth, specially reveled in
these unfortunates, though "tear-jerkers" about them were even
more popular in the fifty years following the manuscript's writ-
ing.
In "The Bride's Farewell" the young woman is tearful at
leaving her family; she also seems to have less than perfect
confidence in her spouse. We suspect that "The Watcher" has
been betrayed. At any rate the song about her was written by
that same Mrs. Hale of Boston who is usually credited with
the juvenile classic "Mary Had a Little Lamb."
Of the three songs in this group one is still heard in the
twentieth century, "Mary of the Wild Moor," which is about
a young woman whose father shut her out in the cold, standard
action for a disapproving male parent. An amiable matron who
"raised" eight happy children told this editor some half-century
ago that her father was so enraged at the idea of her proposed
marriage to a wooer not of her own religious faith that he struck
an attitude and ordered her "never to darken his door again."
Apparently such action fell into what the anthropologists now
call a Pattern of Culture.
83. The Bride's Farewell
The Douglass version of this tearfully sentimental song, which
Sears credits to M. L. Beevor, is almost identical with that in Forget-
Me-Not except for punctuation and spelling.
The Brides Farewell
1. Farewell Mother tears are streaming
Down thy pale and tender cheek
Minor Groups — English and American 183
I in gems and roses gleaming
Scarce this farewell may speak
Farewell Mother now I leave thee
Hopes and fears my bosom swell
One to trust who may deceive me
Farewell Mother fare thee well
2 . Farewell Father thou art smiling
Yet theres sadness on thy brow
Winning me from that beguiling
Tenderness to which I go
Farewell father thou didst bless me
Ere my lips thy name could tell
He may wound who can carress me
Father Guardian fare the well
3. Farewell Sister thou art twining
Round me in affection deep
Wishing joy but neer divining
Why a blessed bride should weep
Farewell brave and gentle Brother
Thou'rt more dear than words can tell
Father Mother Sister Brother
All beloved ones fare ye well
84.. The Watcher
"The Watcher" was written by Sara Josepha Hale (1 788-1 879),
who was for many years editor of Godey's Lady's Book.
There are several differences in wording between the Douglass
version and that of Mrs. Hale as printed in Stedman. Two of the
Stedman wordings improve the rhyme. Stedman stanza 1, line 3 ends
with the word "tearful"; stanza 3, line 1 ends with the word "glanc-
ing." Other differences between Douglass and Stedman are probably
caused by the singer's substitutions to replace misunderstood or for-
gotten words; for instance, in Stedman line 5 of stanza 1 starts "How
wistfully . . ."; in the next line "morn" is used in place of the Doug-
lass word "light"; lines 7 and 8 are:
And then her heart upraises
Its agony of prayer.
In Stedman the last line of stanza 2 is "Smile once again on me!"
184 A Pioneer Songster
The Watcher
1 . The night was dark and f earf ull
The blast swept wailing by
The watcher pale and beautifull
Looked forth with anxious eye
How wishfully she gazes
Know gleam of light is there
Her eyes to heaven she raises
In agony of prayer
2. Within that dwelling lonely
Where want and darkness reign
Her precious child her only
Lies mourning in his pain
And death alone can free him
She feels that this must be
But oh for morn to see him
. . . smile again on me
3. A hundred lights are gleaming
In yonder mansion fair
And merry feet are dancing
They heed not morning there
Of young and joyous creatures
One lamp from out your store
Would bring the young boys features
To his mothers glance once more
4. The morning sun is shining
She headeth not its ray
Beside her dead reclining
Her [the] pale dead mother lay
A smile of hope was wreathing
A smile of hope and love
As though she still was breathing
Theres hope for us above
8 y. Mary of the Wild Moor
Appearing under many different names such as "A Cold Winter's
Night," "The Village Pride," and "The Wind That Blew o'er the
Wild Moor," this sentimental story shows little variation, probably,
Minor Groups — English and American 185
as Belden suggests, because of the frequency with which it has been
printed. Mackenzie reports it in nineteenth-century broadsides. The
form varies between four- and eight-line stanzas. Cox and Mackenzie
agree in exchanging Douglass lines 5-8 with lines 9-12; Scarborough
and Belden interchange Douglass lines 9-12 and 13-16; Eddy's and
Shoemaker's stanzas, though, correspond with Douglass. The seventh
line of each stanza in Douglass, while metrically the same as the other
lines, seems to have lost a foot by comparison with other versions. In
stanza 1 the corresponding line in Scarborough is "For the child in
my arms it will perish and die." In stanza 2 the corresponding line in
Shoemaker (much like Belden and Scarborough) is "But the watch
dog did howl and the village bell toll'd." In stanza 3 Shoemaker has
"Saying: 'This cold winter's night she had perished and died,' " and
in stanza 4 (like Belden and Scarborough) "Saying; 'There Mary
died, once a gay village bride.' " It is possible that the metrical length
of the Douglass lines is due to the tune to which it was sung. If so,
that would account also for the shortening of line 3 in stanza 3. That
line in Scarborough, Belden, and Shoemaker states specifically that
the child was alive the next morning, which Douglass only implies.
Eddy prints the tune to which it is sung in Ohio.
Mary of the Wild Moor
1. One night when the wind blew cold
Blew bitter across the wild Moor
Young Mary she came with her child
Wandering home to her own fathers door
Crying father I pray let me in
Take pity on me I implore
Or the child at my bosom will die
F[rom] the wind that blow across the wild [moor]
2. Oh why did I leave this fair cot
Where once I was happy and free
Doomed to roam without friends or a home
Oh father take pitty on me
But the father deaf to her cry
Not a voice not a sound reached door
But the watch dog did bark and the wind
Blew bitter across the wild moor
1 86 A Fioneer Songster
3. Oh how must the father have felt
When he come to the door in the morn
There he found Mary dead and the child
Fondly clasped in its dead mothers arms
Then in frenzy he tore his grey hair
As on Mary he gazed at the door
For that night she had perished and died
From the winds that blew across the wild moor
4. The old man in grief pined away
The child to the grave was soon borne
And no one lives there to this day
For the cottage to ruin has gone
But the vilagers point out the spot
Where a willow droops over the door
Saying there mary perished and died
From the winds that blew across the wild moor