The Wife of the Free- Geer (NC) 1933 Niles B
[From: The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles, 1961. His notes follow. I don't believe this is traditional- but with Niles you can never be sure how much is a rewrite. You can be sure that Niles knew grammarye meant magic, in certain cases- this ballad however is not one of them!! So Niles substitutes magic for grammaree!!! (Unless it was one of Niles' elves!!) In his notes he adds: "It's not easy to teach an old bear to dance a do-si-do" (see below).
Stanza 6 has this nihilistic (Nilesistic) line: "And we must pray at his feet-a-ree." Curiously this stanza is also found in Helms version from Union County, NC.
R. Matteson 2015]
The Wife of the Free
(Niles No. 33 B)
IN July of 1933, a shy, middle-aged man and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. Carston Geer, sang the only version of "The Wife of Usher's Well" involving magic, and, interestingly enough, the place where the magic was to be learned was New York. Mr. and Mrs. Geer sang for me on the porch of the Dickey Hotel in Murphy, N. C. In those days, dinner at a small-town hotel was an enormous operation that took place at noontime, during the hottest part of the day. The food may not always have been of the first order, but there was a lot of it. In the case of the Dickey Hotel, there were dishes and dishes of food and they were excellent. Of course, one needed a young digestion to manage it - I mean, the food.
Mr. and Mrs. Geer used a strange term in the very first line of their ballad: they referred to the wife of Usher's Well as "the wife of the free." I tried diligently to discover the meaning of this expression, but I never succeeded. Mrs. Geer said she had learned it that way from a schoolmate many years ago, and had been singing it as she had learned it, even though it did not make sense. Said she: "It's not easy to teach an old bear to dance a do-si-do."
1. Wife, wife, wife of the free,
It's she had bright boys three,
And she sent them off to New York-a-ree
To see what the world would be,
To see what the world would be.
2. They hain't been gone some very long time,
A month by days one, two, and three,
"I hope they learn their magic well
And come straight back to me."
(repeat last line of each verse)
3. It was about the Christmas time,
Three months had passed and a day,
When all three boys didd cold and dead,
Yes, all three passed away.
4. Then back they came to Umberland,
Back they came, one, two, and three,
And when their mother saw them well,
She rejoiced with joy-a-ree.
5. "Oh come, oh come, my little ones,
Here is your bed so fine,
And here is a meal of vittles all cooked
For the three of you to dine."
6. "Oh Mother dear, we cannot sleep,
Nor can we ever eat-a-ree,
For Christ, our Saviour, called us home,
And we must pray at his feet-a-ree.
7. "Cold clods of clay is all we need
To cover us head to feet,
But the tears you will forever shed
Will wet our winding sheet."