The Golden Vanity- Getchell/Sanborn (ME) 1888 Barry C
[From Barry and all in British Ballads from Maine, 1929. My title, as a title was not given for this version.
This ballad is found throughout across the US dating back to the early to mid 1800s. The chorus,
As we sailed along the lowlands, lowlands, lowlands,
As we sailed along the lowlands low.
as above or in a similar form was attached to different songs. Certainly a date going back to the 1700s is possible but yet not documented. Barry et all (see below in notes) comment: "One could hardly have better evidence of the date when it came to America. 'With the very first emigrants' is the only answer."
They also add: During the Civil War "lowlands," variously rewritten, was one of the most popular songs.
R. Matteson 2014]
THE GOLDEN VANITY
(Child 286)
"The Golden Vanity" appears to be entirely traditional in Maine. We know no copy in any broadside or early songbook, yet the song was known all over Maine, particularly along the coast, and even to the shores of the St. Lawrence; but we did not happen to find it on the Border, possibly because we saw none of the fishermen. We have not found the "happy ending" of Child B. Instead, our copies end with the death and burial of the intrepid cabin boy. None of Child's traditional copies are very old, and it may be that the American version is as much older than the happy ending versions as it is more effective in singing. During the Civil War "lowlands," variously rewritten, was one of the most popular songs.
This is another of the songs found equally along the Maine seacoast and in the Appalachian highlands; and like those notieed before, it is one of the older ballads, well known in England at a period before the emigration to America began. Indeed the subject matter insures its having been exceedingly popular at just the period when the English settlers were thronging to America; for in one version it is the Turk who is the enemy, and in the other it is Sir Walter Raleigh who is the hero, and both Turk and Raleigh, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, were what today would be called "front-page stories."
Though Walter Raleigh might be called almost the patron of all early adventurers to Virginia, the A-text of Child, bearing his name, does not seem as popular as the other text about the Golden Vanity. Copies containing some mangled form of the name of The Sweet Trinity are found in the South, but in New England the Golden Vanity is usually understood to be the vessel's name, indicating a preference for Child's B text. We do not recall a copy containing the line, "In the Neatherlands," so characteristic of Child A, but always, "the Lowlands" as in B. After all, except for the difference in the burdens, the two versions are closely similar. What is important is that a song which must have reached the height of its popularity in England at the period when colonists were leaving for the New World, should be found in the characteristic "split" texts in the southern Highlands balancing other not dissimilar texts found on the Maine seacoast. One could hardly have better evidence of the date when it came to America. "With the very first emigrants" is the only answer.
C. [Golden Vanity] From the manuscript copy loaned by Mr. Howard Getchell of St. Stephen, New Brunswick, who learned the song forty years ago (about 1888) from Capt. George E. Sanborn. The copy is reproduced verbatim.
1 My father owns a ship
In the North Country
She goes by the name
Of the Golden Vanity
And I fear she will be taken
By some Turkish crew
As she sails along the lowlands.
Chorus
Lowlands, lowlands, as she sails along the lowlands low.
2 The first to speak up
Was the saucy cabin boy
Saying what will You give me
If I will her destroy.
I will give You gold and silver
And my daughter fair and true
If you'll sink her in the, etc.
(Chorus)
3 Then this boy took an auger
And over the side got he
He swam down along side
Where the Turkish frigate lay
And the sentinels all slept
While outward of her he crept
For to sink her in the, etc.
4 This boy he took his auger
And bored it through her twice
While some played cards
While others played the dice
And the water it came in
And put out all her lights
And he sank her in the, etc.
5 This boy he crept down
And back swam he
He swam along side of the Golden Vanity
Crying, Captain pick me up
For I fear I will be drowned
For I've sunk her in the, etc.
6 I will not pick you up
This cruel captain cried
I'll shoot you; I'll drownd you,
I'll send for down the tide
And You shan't have my daughter
To be Your loving bride
For I'll sink you in the, etc'
7. This boy he swam around
All on the starboard side
Crying shipmates Pick me up
for I fear I will be drowned
I am weary, faint and tired
And I can swim no more
I have sunk her in the, etc.
8. His shipmates picked him up
And on the deck he died
They sewed him in his hammock
Which was so long and wide
And they sent his lifeless body
Drifting down the tide.
And they sank him in the lowlands,
Lowlands, lowlands, lowlands,
And they sank him in the lowlands low.