Molly Bawn- Hannah Quinn (Cork) 1896 Littell/Hinkson
[From: Littell's Living Age, Volume 210, edited by Eliakim Littell, Robert S. Littell; 1896. The article by Hinkson was published several times- not sure of the original publication. Excerpts from the article An Irish Peasant Woman by Katherine Tynan Hinkson follow.
R. Matteson 2016]
An Irish Peasant Woman
by
Katherine Tynan Hinkson
She was Hannah Daly before she was Hannah Quinn, and had ballads made to her handsome face in Cork. Afterwards Hannah Daly fell on hard times, for her father provided her with a stepmother of the legendary kind. But little Hannah’s striped back had no power to keep her next time from following the ballad-singers, which seems to have been her principal sin. Let a ballad-singer appear at the end of the street, and Hannah’s tears were dried; her memory and her dread of a flogging were alike wiped clean off the slate of her irresponsible little mind, and off went Hannah and the babies in an intoxication of delight. Surely those ballads never fell on a hungrier ear or more retentive mind. Even yet she will act for you the duets between the -ballad-singer and his wife. the rough humor of which enchanted the crowd. An Irish crowd is the most responsive of audiences. It punctnates the emotion of the ballad-singer's song, as it does the speech from the hustings or the sermon from the altar, with groans and ejaculations.
Molly Bawn
A story, a story to you I will relate
Concerning of a fair maid whose fortunes were great
She roved out one evening, she roved all alone,
She sat below a green bower a shower for to shun.
Young Jimmy being fowling with a gun in his hand,
Fowling all the day till the evenin' came all,
Her apron bein’ about her he took her for a SWan,
But alas to his grief it was fair Molly Bawn.
Jimmy he came home with his gun in his hand.
Sick and broken-hearted, as you understand,
Cryin’ “Father, dearest father, if you knew what I have done,
I have shot Molly Bawn at the settin' of the Sun!
Up spoke his father whose locks they were grey,
Saying, “Son, dearest son, O don't go away,
Stay in the country till your trial comes On,
And you never shall die for the loss of a swan.”
"Twas two or three nights after to her uncle appeared she,
Saying, “Uncle, dearest uncle, let my true love go free,
My apron being about me he took me for a swan,
But alas to his grief I was fair Molly Bawn.”
He cried, “Molly, you’re my jewel, my joy and heart's pride,
And if you had but lived I'd have made you my bride,
You were pride of the country an' flower o' them all,
An' I shortly will follow my own Molly Bawn.”
Hereupon the unhappy lover shot himself. When I asked Mrs. Quinn why the ballad didn't state this definitely she was a little indignant. “Sure, you wouldn’t want to be tould everything?” she asked.