The Dark-Eyed Gipsy O- Robbins (ME) 1926 Barry E1
[From British Ballads from Maine; Barry, Eckstorm and Smyth, 1929. Barry's notes follow. Barry already published A-G in JAFL 1905 so the letter designations for BBM are A1, B1 etc.
Included for comparison is Barry F, the Irish broadside. To view another Irish broadside: http://ballads.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/static/images/sheets/15000/12697.gif
R. Matteson 2015]
GIPSY DAVY
(Child 200)
The texts A-D are evidently from the same stock, tracing to Child J. It is fair to reckon Child J b as a Maine text, since it was taken down about 1840 from the singing of a lady whose mother, Mrs. Farmer, was born in Maine. Professor Kittredge, in JAFL, XXX, 321, prints a Rochester, Mass., text, "a variant of Child's version J," with the air. This air, together with a Cambridge, Mass., air (P.B., in JAFL, XVIIII, 195), a Providence, R. I., aft (ibid, p. 194), Mrs. Young's air, and Dr. Patch's air, has descended traditionally from a common original.
But Mrs. Robbins's E-text is utterly unlike the others and is apparently Irish. The Williams Collection of Irish Broadsides, in the Public Library of Providence, R. I., contains the original of it, purchased some sixty years ago in Ireland. But so far from scouting Mrs. Robbins's text as being recent or doubtfully traditional, we do not question its having been sung on Mount Desert Island for almost a full century and perhaps for a much longer time. For it happens that there is about Mount Desert a stratum of early Irish settlement. Not to mention the terrible wreck of the ship Grand Design, in 1740, upon the ledges near the Western Way, when what were left of the Irish emigrants it was bearing to the New World settled along the Maine coast, there were a
number of stalwart young Irishmen who came at a later period, married wives of the native stock and became the heads of well-known families, still resident. Such are the Longs, the Bulgers, and the Carrolls. And still later came William Lawler, from Waterford, a good singer, whose songs are still remembered as his own. The Irish songs on the Maine coast were in most cases brought over directly by bold sailors, sturdy fishermen, or good craftsmen who came as settlers at an early period, married Yankee girls, and identified themselves with the native English stock, as the laborers and forced emigrants of the Famine period never have done. The latter class had the comic "Paddy" songs of the middle of the last century; but the old balladry of Ireland, which we find abundantly along the Maine coast, came here very much earlier. To show how near Mrs. Robbins's song is to the Irish broadside mentioned, we quote the latter, which we have never found in any American imprint, for comparison.
E. [Dark-Eyed Gipsy O] Taken down, without title, from the recitation of Mrs. Rose Robbins, Northeast Harbor, 1926.
1 Charles rode home in the middle of the night,
Inquiring for his lady O.
"She's gone, she's gone," cried his own servant maid,
"She's following the dark-eyed gipsy O."
2 "Go saddle, go saddle my milk-white steed,
The fastest of my horses O,
And I will ride the length of a night;
I'll find out that dark-eyed gipsy O."
3 He rode east and he rode west,
He rode south and northward, too,
Until he espied a gay old man,
And he was tired and weary O.
4 "Would you forsake your house and lands,
Would you forsake your children, too?"
"I'll eat of the grass and I'll drink of the dew
And I'll follow the dark-eyed gipsy O."
5 She took off her mantle, she tied it round her waist,
She look-ed gay and bonnie O,
Saying, "I'll eat of the grass, I'll drink of the dew
And I'll follow my dark-eyed gipsy O."
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F. Broadside in the Williams Collection of Irish Broadsides, Public Library, Providence, R. I.
Dark-Eyed Gipsy, O
I When Charley came home late at night
Enquiring for his lady, O,
She's gone, she's gone, says his own servant man,
And she's followed the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
2 Go, saddle me my milk-white steed,
The brown was e'er so speedy O,
That I may ride the length of the night
Till I find but the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
3 So Charley rode thus through the length of the night
Till the next morning early O,
It's then he met with gay old man
And he both wet and weary O.
4 Where have you been my gay old man
Where have you been so early O?
Or did you see a fair lady,
And she following the dark-eyed Gipsy O?
5 I have been east, I have been west,
I have been north and southwards O,
And the fairest lady I e'er did see,
Was following the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
6 Then he rode east and he rode west,
He rode north and southwards O,
Until he met with his own wedded wife,
And she following the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
7 Will you forsake your houses and lands,
Will you forsake your children O,
Will you forsake your own wedded lord
And follow the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
8 What do I care for houses or lands,
What do I care for my children O?
What do I care for my own wedded lord,
While I follow the dark-eyed Gipsy O.
9 Then she took the garment that she wore
And wound it as a head-dress O,
Saying, I'll eat the grass and drink the dew
And I'll follow the dark-eyed Gipsy O.