The Scolding Wife- Underhill (VT) 1938 Flanders N
Flanders' Ancient Ballads- 1965; Notes by Coffin
The Farmer's Curst Wife
(Child 278)
Coffin's notes: There is an old proverb that says there are but two places where a man wants to have his wife- in bed and in the grave. Certainly, the scolding wife, one who can rout the devil himself, has left her mark on folklore from India and Russia to the western countries. This particular anecdote concerning her is a favorite of the American informant with a similar song, "The Devil in search of a wife," it was also popular among the printers of nineteenth-century London broadsides. ["The Sussex Farmer" being close to, or the origin of, Child A. "The Devil in search of a wife" is quite different- see English & Other versions- except for the last few stanzas.]
Originally, it must have concerned a contract in which a farmer hired the devil to do some plowing in exchange for a member of the family. The farmer, in many texts, worries that he may lose his eldest son and is relieved when his wife is taken. The American versions follow Child A as a rule, it being rare that the wife come back to her cooking as in Child B. However, the yoking of the dogs and hogs to the plow and the proverbial sayings at the close of the song are frequently added to the Child A base in the New world.
The Flanders material needs little comment. Texts A and B, in which the farmer seems to be rather proud of his wife's triumph over the forces of hell are not common, though Phillips Barry, British Ballad's from Maine, 330-1, prints an example from Northeast Harbor. Nor are the C-I "Anthony Rowley" texts with the "right leg, left leg," refrains. But C in which the wife is the farmer, harnesses the cattle herself, and goes to the gates of hell, is the only text that introduces a really radical story variation. C is a noteworthy find.
American references for Child 278 may be found in Coffin, 148-50. see also Dean-Smith, 66, and Belden, 94-95, for English citations. Barry, op. cit., 332, cites local uses of the motif in New England.
The tunes for child 278 all belong to one tune family. A large proportion of them are especially closely related; the following tunes are slightly divergent: Ordway, Davis, Weeks, Brackett. The Underhill, Farnham, and Lorette tunes are very similar, as are the Moses and Blake tunes.
For general relationship to the larger group of tunes, see FCBa, 116, 117, 119; DV, 598 No. 46 (c), 599 No. 46 (E) and (F), 601 No. 46 (L); GCM, 373; Sharp I, 215, 278.
Flanders N. Mrs. Florence Underhill, with two sisters, the Misses Young of Bellows Falls, Vermont, remembered this song as sung by their father, Edward O. Young, uncle of the late Dr. Ellis of Brookfield, Vermont. H. H. F., Collector; November 2, 1938.
Structure: A B C D (internal repetition) Ed (2,2,2,2,4); Rhythm A; Contour: undulating; Scale: hexatonic; t.c. G.
For mel. rel. see GCM, 377; Sharp I, 277 C.
The Scolding Wife
A farmer he yoked up his pigs for to plow,
Fy-lay, fy-liddle, fy-lay.
He yoked up his pigs one day for to plow
And one broke away, the devil knows how!
With a twice fy-lay, fy-liddle, fy-lay me down.
(Follow pattern of first stanza for all stanzas.)
The devil he came to him one day,
Saying, "One of your family I must take away."
Then said the farmer, "I'm undone,
For the devil has called for my oldest son."
" 'Tis not your eldest son I crave
But your old scolding wife I must have."
"Oh, take her, oh, take her, with all my heart.
I hope you'll live happy and never part."
The devil he threw her across his back
And looked like a pedlar a-carrying a pack.
He laid her right down beside of hell's door,
Saying, "Now go in and say no more."
She saw the young devils preparing the chains
So she up with her foot and she kicked out their brains.
Then says the old devil, "Must carry her back,
For I believe, on my soul, she would destroy the whole pack."
Then he took her and threw her across his back
And the damned old pedlar came bringing her back.
There's just three things that the devil can't drive-
A hog, and a woman, and bees into a hive.