The West Countree- Eva Case (MO) pre-1916; Belden E
[From Ballads and Songs by G. L. Kittredge; The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 30, No. 117 (Jul. - Sep., 1917), pp. 283-369. Also reprinted in Missouri Folklore Society (Ballads and Songs) edited Belden 1940 as version E. This is the family version of Eva Warner Case and dates back a number of years before 1916, through her mother and grandmother.
Kittredge's notes for his 1917 JAFL article follow.
R. Matteson 2014]
THE TWA SISTERS (Child, No. 10).
The first scholar to publish an American text of this ballad was Child, who printed, in 1883, as version U (I: 137), a fragment of four stanzas (with burden), communicated by Mr. W. W. Newell from the recitation of an old woman who had learned the song in Long Island, N.Y. This fragment was a near relative of Child's R, a version current in England, and of his S, a Scottish fragment from Kinloch's MS. In 1884 Child printed (as Y) a Kentish version (from Percy's papers), which was sent to Percy in 1770 and 1775 (I: 495-496); and this is also near akin to the American text, which thus appears to be of respectable antiquity. Since Child's death, better copies of the American version have been collected. See JAFL 18: 130-132; 19: 233-235; 28: 200-202; Belden, No. 2; Shearin and Coombs[sic], p. 7; F. C. Brown, p. 9; Pound, p. II; Virginia Folk-Lore Society, Bulletin, No. 2, p. 3; No. 3, p. 2; No. 4, p. 5; No. 5, p. 5; Cox, 44: 428, 441-442; 45 : 159 (cf. JAFL 29: 400). Belden has collected five variants, in all of which the miller is hanged for "drowning Sister Kate." There is an American text in Child's MSS., XXI, 10, article 5, which ends as follows: -
The miller he was burnt in flame,
The eldest sister fared the same.
1. The West Countree- Communicated by Professor Belden, 1916, as written down from memory by Mrs. Eva Warner Case, with the assistance of her mother and grandmother; Harrison County, Missouri.[1]
[Music]
1. There was an old man lived in the West,
Bow down,
There was an old man lived in the West,
The bow's a-bend o'er me,
There was an old man lived in the West,
He had two daughters of the best.
I'll be true to my love, if my love will be true to me.
2. The squire he courted the older first,
But still he loved the younger best.
3. The first that he bought her was a beaver hat.
The older thought right smart of that.
4. The next that he bought her was a gay gold ring.
He never bought the older a thing.
5. "Sister, O Sister! let's walk out,
And see the ships all sailing about."
6. They walked all along the salt-sea brim,
The older pushed the younger in.
7. "Sister, O Sister! lend me your hand,
And then I'll gain the promised land."
8. "It's neither will I lend you my hand nor my glove,
And then I'll gain your own true love."
9. Sometimes she'd sink, sometimes she'd swim,
Sometimes she'd grasp a broken limb.
10. Down she sank and off she swam,
She swam into the miller's dam.
11. The miller went fishing in his own mill-dam,
And he fished this lady out of the stream.
12. Off her finger he pulled three rings,
And dashed her in the brook again.
13. The miller was hanged on his own mill-gate
For the drowning of my sister Kate.
1 On recent English tradition, see Sharp, One Hundred English Folksongs, No. I, pp. xxi-xxii, 29-31 (" The Outlandish Knight").
Ballads and Songs. 287