The Lady of York- Devlin (NY-PA) c1875 Lomax
[From Never Without a Song, U. Illinois, Sof (1995), p121 by Katharine D. Newman. As sung by Jennie Devlin, recorded by Lomax in 1937. Since she learned this as a child (born 1865) I'm assigning a dated of c. 1875.
R. Matteson 2014]
Lady of York
There was a lady lived in york,
All alone and a-lonely.
She fell in love with her father's clerk,
Down by the green bush side-y.
She had a garter long and straight,
All alone and a-lonely.
She tied them by their little hands and feet,
Down by the green bush side-y.
She had a penknife keen and sharp.
All alone and a-lonely.
She pierced them through their tender little hearts,
Down by the green bush side-y.
She buried them under the marble stone,
All alone and a-lonely,
And then she turned for to go home,
Down by the green bush side-y.
She's a-walking through her father's hall,
All alone and a-lonely,
And there she saw two little babes
Playing trip-trip and ball,
Down by the green bush side-y.
"O, babes, O, babes, if you were mine,
All alone and a-lonely,
I would dress you up in silks so fine,
Down by the green bush side-y."
"O, mother, dear mother, we once were thine,
All alone and a-lonely,
But you dressed us not in silks so fine,
Down by the green bush side-y.
"You had a garter long and straight,
All alone and a-lonely,
You had a pen-knife keen and sharp,
Down by the green bush side-y.
"You buried us under the marble stone,
All alone and a-lonely.
And then you turned for to go home,
Down by the green bush side-y.
"O, mother, dear mother, heaven is high,
All alone and a-lonely,
But that's the place you cannot fly,
Down by the green bush side-y.
"O, mother, dear mother, hell is low,
All alone and a-lonely,
And there's the place where you must go,
Down by the green bush side-y."
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Alan Lomax: "Where is York?"
Grandma Deb: "Some county. Kay will tell you."
Alan Lomax: "A very sad song. Did that happen when you were a girl?"
Grandma Deb: "Well, I learned it that way. When I sang it, it always made me feel-any of these pieces-made me feel pensive. You know what I mean? Like 'Martha Decker' did. See, in olden times, son, when anything happened seriously like that, why there'd be a cabinetl from it. Lots of them pieces I could sing when I was little, better than I can sing them now."
This is a "revenant" ballad, that is, the characters come back to life. It is the only supernatural story that Jennie Devlin learned. She accepted the horror of babies returning from the grave to demand revenge; when children were wronged, justice had to be meted out in this world or the next.