William and Margaret- London Broadside c1680 (1711 stamped) (1724 by Mallet)
[From The Roxburghe Ballads, Volume 3; Chappell. Chappell's date of c.1680, which he says may not be accurate, was taken from an auction listing. Child following Chappell dates it 1711 and Chappell sites an "Inland Revenue Stamp of 1711, bearing the motto of Queen Anne," on the black letter broadside as evidence. Following is the most extensive article by Chappell; it includes the original broadside text that Mallett used to compose his version in 1724.
Child comments in his headnotes: "The ballad supposed to be lost has been lately recovered, in a copy of the date 1711, with the title 'William and Margaret, an Old Ballad,' and turns out to be substantially the piece which Mallet published as his own in 1724, Mallet's changes being comparatively slight. 'William and Margaret' is simply 'Fair Margaret and Sweet William' rewritten in what used to be called an elegant style. Nine of the seventeen stanzas are taken up with a rhetorical address of Margaret to false William, who then leaves his bed, raving, stretches himself on Margaret's grave, thrice calls her name, thrice weeps full sore, and dies."
The date of the stamp on the broadside (dated by Chappell as 1711) has been questioned (Swaen- 1917). See David Atkinson's examination of "William and Margaret" in my Recording & Info section. Atkinson dates the "Fair Margaret's Misfortune" broadside (Child 74) c. 1720 by Bates.
"William and Margaret" begins with stanza 5 of the broadside, "Fair Margaret's Misfortune" which is Child 74 version A.
R. Matteson 2014]
Chappell:
In taking a present farewell of the members, I beg their indulgence for adding one ballad which, although not included in either of the two large collections, is in a detached volume of the same Library. Not only is it one of the best of our old ballads, but also there is literary interest attached to it, the authorship having been claimed by David Mallet in 1723, and this edition refuting that claim. The volume containing it was purchased for the British Museum by Mr. Boone, the bookseller, in 1871, consequently since the publication of my Popular Music of the Olden Time, in which it would otherwise have been included, because it supplies the long forgotten tune. By a singular coincidence, after the lapse of a hundred and fifty years, a second copy of the same edition of the ballad has been brought to light, it having been sold by Messrs. Puttick and Simpson only last year. It was Lot 314 of the library of the late Sir Alexander Spearman, and was brought to tho hammer on the 9th of January, 1878. It is thus described in the auctioneer's catalogue: "William and Margaret, an Old Ballad of seventeen verses, set to music, black letter, with the original halfpenny postage stamp, circa 1680." I had small faith in a "halfpenny postage stamp, circa 1680," but attended the auction on the day of sale, without having sufficient time to examine the copy before it was under the hammer. Mr. J. Harvey purchased it for eleven shillings, and by his permission, I submitted it to a careful scrutiny. The supposed postage stamp proved to be one of the Inland Revenue stamps for the halfpenny duty on newspapers, imposed in Queen Anne's reign, and bearing the usual motto of a regnant Queen, "Semper eadem."
The tune of the ballad is printed in what is now termed the soprano clef, properly the C clef, set upon the lowest line. For the convenience of subscribers, I here reproduce the melody in modern notation, omitting the base. Any one who has the privilege of a reader's ticket at the British Museum can see the copy from which it is taken, by writing for "William and Margaret, an Old Ballad," giving the reference " 1876. f. 1, p. 107—London, n.d. folio." The Act of Parliament for stamps upon newspapers passed in 1711 (10th of Anne, cap. 19, sect. 101). Scotland was exempt from stamp duty until 1806. The Act was not intended to apply to ballads, and they were speedily excepted from its operation. An instance of this will be seen by referring to fol. 70 of the same volume: "The Weeping Church-men, Being a Mourning Copy of Verses on the departure of our late Soveraign Queen Anne, who departed this Life, August the first, 1714. Tune of Troy Town." It presents a portrait of Queen Anne, with her crown on her head, and the motto, "Semper eadem," in capital letters round the top of her dress. "London: Printed for Tho. Norris at the LookingGlass on London Bridge." That has no stamp, and it is indeed quite a rarity to find a ballad which has one.
Public attention was first drawn to the ballad of William and Margaret by Aaron Hill, the dramatist, in The Plain Dealer, No. xxxvi. on Friday, July 24, 1724. Within the same year it was published with Mallet's alterations by Allan Ramsay in his Tea Table Miscellany. In the next year, 1725, it was reprinted from the older copy in vol. iii. of Old Ballads, 12mo.; which, on the authority of Dr. Farmer, were edited by Ambrose Phillips, the pastoral poet and dramatic author. Phillips's version could not have been copied from Mallet's, because it omits all his alterations, and agrees with the Queen Anne copy here reproduced. It is, in fact, a reprint from the old ballad quoted by Fletcher, which was supposed to have been lost. Allan Ramsay was not one who would scrutinize too closely a claim which would add to the reputation of one of his countrymen. In fact, Ramsay set the example of making unfounded claims, having himself appropriated, among a multiplicity of other English productions, his friend Gay's ballad of "Black-eyed Susan," and printed it as Scotch. Therefore, when he addressed "Mr. David Malloch, on his departure from Scotland," (Poems by Allan Ramsay, ii. 169, edit, of 1751), he did not hesitate to give him the credit of the ballad he had claimed. Malloch changed his name to Mallet only when he arrived in England. At the time when Allan Ramsay thus addressed him, Malloch had never left Scotland. He was then a student in the University of Edinburgh. It would have puzzled Mallet to say who made that tune for him, and wrote it out in antiquated notation. It is in the ancient reciting style, of the Chevy Chase order, and very unlike a Scotch tune. It wus never printed to his words, and seems to have been little, if at all, known in Scotland. Not quite so in England, for, without going beyond the volume already quoted, we find at fol. 160, "Wonder upon Wonder; or, the Cocoa tree's answer to the Surrey Oak. To the tune of William and Margret." It is a parody upon the old ballad, and begins:
"'Twas in the dark and dead of night
Hard by St. James's Square,
Where many a Squire, and many a Knight,
Brimful of wine and care."
This is dated in pencil, 1756.
The tune has the appearance of being much older than Queen Anne's reign. It is not of the dance order, but one eminently suited for recitation, as an old minstrel would have chanted it.
William and Margaret- the old Minstrel tune- from a black-letter ballad
[music]
When Malloch first gave the ballad with his alterations to Allan Ramsay, it can hardly be supposed that he had read Beaumont and Fletcher's plays. They would not have been included in the curriculum of University education. But he afterwards claimed that he had done so, and that he had founded his ballad upon the lines quoted by Old Merrythought in The Knight of the Burning Pestle, which are as follows:
"When it was grown to dark midnight,
And all were fast asleep,
In came Margaret's grimly ghost
And stood at William's feet."
If he had so intended, why did he alter those very lines?
There is another way of accounting for this. He had the ballad in the printed copy before him, but changed these first lines to avoid detection when he passed it off as his own.
Mallet's first version, given by him to Ramsay, begins:
"'Twos at the fearful midnight hour,
When all were fast asleep,
In glided Margaret's grimly ghost,
And stood at William's feet."
He here takes the word "glided " from the printed copy, and not from Fletcher.
When Mallet afterwards published it in his own name, in his Poems, 8vo. 1743, and again in 12mo. edit, of 1759, he changed it to:
"'Twas in the silent solemn hour,
When night and morning meet."
This is more unballad-like than the first. Instead of the characteristic conciseness, and the simplicity of expression, in the old minstrel ballad, he took half a line to express "midnight," as "When night and morning meet."
It is equally clear that Aaron Hill, although a writer for the stage, had not noticed this quotation from the ballad in Fletcher's play. He says: "I am never more delighted than when I meet with an opportunity to unveil obscure merit, and produce it into notice. . . . My having taken up, in a late perambulation, as I stood upon the top of Primrose Hill, a torn leaf of one of those Hulfpenny Miscellanies which are published for the use and pleasure of our nymphs of low degree, and known by the name of Garlands ... I fell unexpectedly upon a work, for so I have no scruple to call it, that deserves to live for ever! and which (notwithstanding its disguise of coarse brown paper, almost unintelligible corruptions of sense from the blunders of the press, with here and there an obsolete low phrase which I have alter'd for the clearer explanation of the author's meaning) is so powerfully filled throughout with that blood-curling, chilling influence of Nature working on our passions (which Criticks call the Sublime), that I never met it stronger iu Homer himself; nor even in that prodigious English genius, who has made the Greek our Countryman. The simple title of this Piece was, 'William and Margaret. A Ballad."
Hill then goes on to spoil the ballad by his modernizations. One stanza will suffice as an example:
"When Hope lay hush'd in silent Night
And woe was wrapped in Sleep,
In glided Marg'ret's pale-ey'd Ghost,
And stood at William's feet."
"I am sorry," says Hill, "that I am not able to acquaint my Reader with his name, to whom we owe this melancholy Piece of finished Poetry; under the humble title of a Ballad."
It is to be regretted that the Garland of which Hill speaks has not yet been found; we will therefore turn to the simple ballad as it stands in the black-letter edition of Queen Anne's time.
[Brit. Mm. Coll. 1876. f. 1, folio 107.]
William and Margaret, An Old Ballad.
When all was wrapt in dark Mid-night,
And all were fast asleep,
In glided Margaret's grimly ghost,
And stood at William's feet.[1] 4
Her face was like the[2] April Morn,
Clad in a wintry cloud,
And Clay cold was her Lilly hand,
That held the[3] Sable Shrowd. 8
So shall the fairest Face appear
When Youth & Years are flown;
Such is the Robe that Kings must wear
When Death has reft their Crown. 12
Her Bloom was like the springing Flow'r,
That sips the Silver Dew;
The Rose was budded in her Cheek,
And opening to the View. 16
But Love had, like the Canker Worm,
Consum'd her early Prime:
The Rose grew pale, and left her Cheek;
She dy'd before her Time. 20
"Awake!" she cry'd, "thy true Love calls,
Come from her Midnight grave;
Now let thy Pity hear the Maid,
Thy Love refus'd to save! 24
"This is the mirk and fearful[4] Hour
When injur'd Ghosts complain,
And dreary[5] graves give up their Dead,
To haunt the faithless Swain. 28
"Bethink thee, William, of thy fault,
Thy Pledge, and broken Oath;
And give me hack my Maiden-Vow,
And give me hack my Troth. 32
"How could you say my Fape was fair,
And yet that Face forsake?
How could you win my Virgin-Heart,
Yet leave that Heart to break ?[6] 36
"How[7] could you promise Love to me,
And not that Promise keep?
Why did you swear mine Eyes were bright,
Yet leave those Eyes to weep? 40
"How could you say my Lip was sweet,
And made the Scarlet pale?
And why did I, young witless Maid!
Believe the flattering Tale? 44
"That Face, alas! no more is fair;
These lips no longer red;
Dark are mine[8] Eyes, now clos'd in Death,
And every Charm is fled. 48
"The hungry Worm my Sister is;
This Winding-Sheet I wear:
And cold & weary lasts our Night,
Till that last Morn appear. 52
"But hark! The Cock has warn'd me hence:
A long and last ADIEU!
Come see, false Man, how low she lies,
That dy'd for Love of you!" 56
Now Birds did sing, and Morning smile,
And shew her glistering Head;[9]
Pale William shook in ev'ry Limb,
Then, raving, left his Bed. 60
He hy'd him to the fatal Place
Where Margaret's Body lay,
And stretcht him on the green Grass Turf,
That wrapt her Breathless Clay. 64
And thrice he call'd on Margaret's Name,
And thrice he wept full sore;
Then laid his Cheek to the cold Earth,[10]
And Word spake never more. 68
Footnotes:
1 Having already referred to the changes Mallet made in the first stanza, the following notes are upon his other deviations from the text.
2 an April.
3 her sable.
4 Mallet changes "mirk and fearful" to "dumb and dreary." "Mirk," signifying gloomy darkness, as of a dungeon and as imagined of hell, is a good A.S. word, which continued in use down to the time of Spenser and Hohnshed. It was perhaps first changed into " murk" in Shakespeare's time, but the older and more correct spelling is still in use. Mallet must have had but an imperfect knowledge of English when he made his deteriorating change.
5 "And dreary" changed to "Now yawning."
6 Mallet transposes this stanza for the next.
7 How changed to "Why" in this and in the next stanza.
8 Mine changed to "my."
9. Mallet here rejects "glistering head," though glistering and glittering are the same: so he changed the two lines to
"The lark sung loud; tho morning smil'd
With beams of rosy red."
In his Allan Ramsay version he had—
"The lark sung out, the morning smil'd,
And rais'd ner glist'ring head;
Pale William quak'd in every limb."
10. Mallet changes " the cold earth " to " her cold grave."
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The broadside has no printer's name to it, but in its place, the following:
"N.B.—This Ballad will sing to the Tunes of Montrose's Lilt Rothes's Lament, or the Isle o' Kell."
The above notice tells the story of the edition. The ballad was reprinted for the Chapmen who travelled into Scotland, to sell their books and ballads. The proper tune is printed with the words, but, it being unknown in Scotland, three others are indicated, to any of which the words may be sung. Mallet's acquaintance with the ballad was undoubtedly owing to the purchasing of a copy from one of these Chapmen.
Black-letter printing continued in favour to a later date in Scotland than in England.
There was a considerable trade in English ballads carried on by these Chapmen, both in Ireland and in Scotland. We find by the Registers of the Stationers' Company, that there were six London ballad publishers in partnership in the trade with Ireland, and on some ballads we see, after the address of the publisher, "Where English and Irish Chapmen can be supplied with [chap] books and ballads." The trade with Scotland was of later growth. It may be said to have commenced in 1679, when James, Duke of York and Albany, was sent to Scotland as "Commissioner," by Charles II., pending the discussion on- the Exclusion Bill in the Houses of Parliament. Ballads had been virtually prohibited in Scotland for nearly a century before that date. In 1574, the Regent Earl of Morton had induced the Privy Council to issue an edict that "nane tak upon hand to emprent, or sell, whatsoever book, ballet, or other werk," without its being examined and licensed, under pain of death, and confiscation of goods." This drove away the Dutch printer Robert Lekpreuik from Scotland, and it was only by obtaining fresh assistance from Holland, that the first Scotch Bible could be printed. In August, 1579, two poets of Edinburgh, a schoolmaster and a "notar," were hanged for having cast reflections upon Morton, for his "sinistrous dealing" by their ballads; and in October of the same year, the Estates passed an Act condemning bards, minstrels and songsters as sturdy beggars and vagrants (R. Chambers's Domestic Annals of Scotland, vol. i. pp. 94, 125 and 131). Other Acts followed, like one against singing carols, in November, 1581. Next, the clergy refused to marry any couple without a deposit of "ten punds Scots," to be forfeited if they had a fiddler at or after the wedding. Although the Scotch pound was only twenty pence, this was a heavy penalty for the poorer classes.[1]
Such being the state of the laws in Scotland, it was only during the Civil War that ballads could be published, and then without the printers' names. James, however, knew the influence of ballads upon the common people in England, and thought he could gain a little popularity in Scotland by their means. He therefore permitted them, and perhaps the first was "The Banishment of Poverty, by his R.H., J. D. A." [James Duke of Albany] "to the tune of The Last Good Night." A copy of this was included in the collection of the late eminent David Laing. From this small beginning sprung a trade with England which became considerable in the last century, both as to ballads and songs with music.