A Catalogue Sampler

Since its earliest days as a paper magazine, Musical Traditions magazine has been producing cassettes of important music which was not commercially available in the UK.  Later, after the move to the Internet, we started production of a new series in CD-R format, and the first of these - a double CD of Suffolk singer Bob Hart - was published in June 1998.

So it's now approaching seven years since MT started issuing CDs.  In that time, a startling 54 discs (14 doubles, 8 singles, plus 6 CD-ROMS and a dozen peripherals) have emerged from my little wind-powered forge here in Stroud.  The change to a new packaging format in 2002 (DVD case with integral booklet) has resulted in the evential conversion of all our CDs to that format - finishing with this Catalogue Sampler, originally published in 2002.

That original sampler featured one track from each of the 22 records then published, plus a few extra tracks to fill up an 80 minute CD.  Since then another four doubles and a single have been added to the catalogue, so this new 2005 version includes examples from the complete list.

My hope is that this full and inexpensive CD may find a wider audience than any of the individual publications have, and may open a few eyes to the riches to be found within MT's catalogue, of which it has been said:

... some of the best collections available of traditional music - Steve Winnick, writing in Dirty Linen
... this small but very valuable catalogue - Vic Smith in fRoots
And of our CD booklets: ... a very significant contribution to folk-song scholarship - Dave Atkinson in Folk Music Journal

Rod Stradling - March 2005

All of the following text is drawn from the booklets accompanying the CDs, suitably edited for this publication. The complete booklet notes, photos and tracklists for each of the CDs can be found published as Articles in Musical Traditions Internet Magazine.

~~~

"Twenty men and boys scythed the corn and sang as they went." "What was the song, Davie?" "Never mind the song - it was the singing that counted."

Ronald Blythe - Akenfield

~~~

The Singers and their Songs:

He left school at Michaelmas 1905, the time of year when jobs became open on farms, but he didn't stay a farm worker for long.  An argument with his boss caused him to run away to sea, so his career as a fisherman came about as a reaction against the injustice he encountered on the farm.  Such a career move was not uncommon in the area.  Life on board ship gave the worker a small world which, if he was lucky, could be comradely; the presence of a kindly skipper could create a family atmosphere in place of the usual hat-doffing servant-master relationship of the farm worker to his boss. 

In 1914 he joined army, went to France, and in 1916 had half his jaw blown away - he spent the rest of the war in hospital.  During his convalescence he stayed with his brother in Snape, met the girl he was to marry, and remained there the rest of his life doing various jobs, finally ending up working in Snape maltings, along with many other singers in the area, and stayed there for 40 years.

After retirement, tragedy struck and Bob lost his wife and two sons in three years: "I never really took singing seriously until after I retired.  I used to sing in the old pubs, but after I lost the wife and the boys, rather than mope I knew I'd got to do something, so I kept with the crowd and started singing.  I don't know how I should 'a got through these last years if I hadn't 'a took up singing."

1 - Cod Banging-O (Roud 1747)
(Recorded by Bill Leader at Bob's home in Snape, September? 1969.  Track taken from Bob Hart: A Broadside MTCD301-2)

Come come my lads and listen here
A fisherman's song you soon shall hear
What I did and undergo
When first I went on the cod banging-O
To me la-fol-der-day, riddle-ol-day
This is a smacksman's life at sea.

How well I remember on the 14th of May
A big barque ship she came our way
She came our way and did let fly
And the tops'l halyards they flew sky high
To me la-fol-der-day, etc...

And now we draw near Harwich pier
The young and the old they both draw near
To see us get our fish on deck
And crack their skulls with a little short stick
To me la-fol-der-day, etc...

And no my song is nearly done
I hope I've not offended one
I don't think I've got it complete
We've only been in the trade about a week
To me la-fol-der-day, etc...

Cyril Poacher: was born at Stone Common, near Blaxhall, Suffolk, in 1910, to Alice (née Ling) and Lewis Poacher of Blaxhall.  Like his father he was a cowman almost all his life.  He married, joined the army and was stationed at Catterick Camp during Second World War, before returning to Blaxhall in 1946, to work at Grove Farm, where he remained until he retired in 1975.  In the early '70s, he moved to live in nearby Snape with his wife.

He learned songs as a child by listening to his grandfather, William 'Cronie' Ling, and his grandfather's brothers, Aaron and Aldeman, and he began singing at eight years old.  He first sang in public in Blaxhall Ship at the age of about nineteen.  He also learned songs from other local singers there, many being of his father's and grandfather's generations. 

2 - The Bonny Bunch of Roses (Roud 664 / Laws J5)
(Recorded by Tony Engle at Grove Farm, Blaxhall, September, 1974.  Track taken from Cyril Poacher: Plenty of Thyme MTCD303)

In the dangers of the ocean,
All in the middle of the month of June,
Our feathering ones do falter
Seem-ly in grief and woe,
Converted by young Bony-parte
Concerned in the bonny bunch of roses o.

"How now" said young Napoleon
As he clasped his mother by the hand,
"Oh Mother do have patience
Whilst I've got life I will give command.
I will raise a terrible army
Through tremendous dangers go,
And in spite of all that Unity
Will gain the bonny bunch of roses o.

He took five thousand men
Likewise horses to ride there on,
He was so well provided
He was enough to sweep this world along.
And when he came near Moscow
He was overpowered by the driven snow,
And Moscow was a'blazing
We lost the bonny bunch of roses o."

"Oh Son, look at your Father
In Saint Helena his body lays low,
And you must follow after
Be aware of the bonny bunch of roses o."

"Oh Mother adieu for ever
As I lie on my dying bed,
If I 'd a-lived, I might have been clever
And now I have lost my youthful head,
And when my bones lay smouldering
Weeping willows o'er me grow,
In the deeds of bold Napoleon
We will sting the bonny bunch of roses o."

Napoleon Bonaparte was unquestionably a hero - or potential liberator - to sections of the English working classes (we may presume that this attitude extended to oppressed classes throughout Europe).  This may be attributed to the social and economic conditions of the time; Combination Acts, Transportation, inhuman floggings, the Peterloo massacre ... everything in fact that Shelley had in his sights when he wrote The Mask of Anarchy. 

The times were extremely oppressive: ideals of freedom and democracy for the lower orders were anathema to the ruling class; and aspirations of liberty and equality had filtered down to the lower orders from a then undemocratised emergent bourgeoisie.  Revolutions never happen in vacuums, and the conditions which gave rise to the French and American Revolutions, and indeed the abortive Irish one, were at work all over Europe.  Also, the success of the first two was fed into the consciousness of oppressed peoples everywhere.  The French Revolution had acted as a beacon to the contemporary English working class in just the same way that the Russian Revolution mobilised left wing labour a century or so later.  Thus, Napoleon was viewed as the emblem of liberty and the saviour of the working classes in the same way as Lenin and Stalin eventually were. 

It is likely that many Napoleonic songs are Irish in origin, yet it would seem that they had a common currency throughout these islands.  For instance, Robert Cinnamond's Napoleon Bonaparte was learnt by him from someone who'd picked it up in England.  Henry Burstow's repertoire included seven Naopleonic songs and Holloway & Black in Later English Broadside Ballads list about a dozen, all from English printers.  In this context it's worth remembering that the working poor of both Ireland and England suffered very similar oppressions, for much the same reasons, from much the same people ... and sometimes from exactly the same people! Whatever the case, it's interesting to note that of the literally hundreds of Napoleon ballads printed in England at the time (mostly jingoistically opposed to 'The Little Corsican'), almost all those remaining in the country singers' repertoires a century later were either ambivalent or actually pro-Bonaparte. 

If Napoleon provided the basis for many broadside ballads, none has survived so well as this supposed conversation between Marie Louise of Austria, Bonaparte's second wife and her son Napoleon II.  Following Bonaparte's abdication in 1814, the Allies refused to recognise Napoleon II who was left alone in Vienna.  Like his father before him, the young Napoleon's dreams of power were dashed, in his case by an early death from tuberculosis.  It is a song that Cyril learned from Bob Scarce.

George Townshend: was born at Wootten Farm, East Chiltington, near Lewes, on August 29th, 1882.  His father was bailiff of Wootten Farm at that time, but when George was seven years old, his father decided to take over The Jolly Sportsman at East Chiltington on September 29th 1888, and on that occasion George made his first public appearance as a singer.  He was stood on a form beside his father and together they sang the two songs with which they were to make a practice of opening their double turn: The Echoing Horn and When the Spring Comes In, two songs which his father had taught him.  His father was well-known locally as a singer, and for many years they sang together in harmony, the older singer taking the bass part. 

His father soon returned to farming and at eleven years old, George joined him.  He worked at farming for 7½ years, and his first job was as a carter boy and from this he graduated to horseman, and even stand-in oxman for a while.  The Great Lewes Sheep and All Cattle Fair in September was the biggest day of the year, and later when the cattle had been sold, George and his father, together with others who liked singing, would retire to a large tent or booth for about three hours of songs.  That was the day in the year when you could really hear songs, as there were singers from miles around, including many shepherds who were normally unable to join in the pub evenings. 

Like Bob Hart, George's time in farming was terminated by an argument and he entered the employ of the Brighton & South Coast Railway company, going into the engineer's office as a timekeeper.  That was in 1901.  In 1908 he married a local woman, became a sergeant in the Volunteer Company of the Royal Garrison Artillery, and in 1914 he joined up, full time.  He was sent to France, railroading. 

George returned to the railway after the war and remained there until December 31st 1949.  During the last eight years he was Personal Messenger to the Chief Mechanical Engineer at Brighton.

He was taken by his father to see fox hunting when he was three years of age, and he continued to follow the Southdown Hunt on foot until 1964 when ill-health prevented him.  Hunting songs had a great appeal for him - his favourite was:

3 - The Echoing Horn (The Glittering Dewdrops) (Roud 878)
(Recorded by Brian Matthews at George's home, Lewes, 7.2.60.  Track taken from George Townshend: Come Hand to Me the Glass MTCD304)

The glittering dewdrops that spangles in the morn
The glittering dewdrops that spangles in the morn
Oh the bright shining dewdrops
Oh the bright shining dewdrops
Oh the bright shining dewdrops
That spangles in the morn.

Chorus:
Oh echo, bright echo, the echoing horn (x2)
As she skim(s) through the dew
On a bright smiling (summer's) morn,
We will follow the hounds with an echoing horn;
How sweet it is to follow the echoing horn.

All nature's so charming, so pleasant is the morn (x2)
We will all join together (x3)
At the sound of the horn.

When Puss rose from cover, 'twas early in the morn (x2)
Oh how sweet it is to follow (x3)
At the sound of the horn.

This was one of the first songs George learned from his father.  It's not a well-known song - Steve Roud's Folk Song Index has but three separate sightings.  Inevitably, the Copper family sing it, and it also turns up as song No 12 in the Holme Valley (Yorkshire) Tradition's book of hunting songs.

Walter Pardon: lived all his life in the redbrick farm workers' cottage where he was born on 4th March 1914, in the village of Knapton, Norfolk.  All the male family members, on both sides, had been farm workers of one kind or another for as far back as anyone could remember, so young Walter was unusual in that he was apprenticed at fourteen to a carpenter in the village of Paston, and spent all his working life as a carpenter, interrupted by four years in the army (again as a carpenter, at Aldershot) during the Second World War. 

This was by no means the only unusual thing about him … to begin with, he was an only child - a rarity in that time, place and social stratum.  Perhaps he enjoyed the solitary life, and the independence it brought, since he remained a bachelor all his days.  But the most remarkable thing - perhaps almost unique for a traditional singer - was that he rarely if ever sang outside the family home.  Yet he kept a huge repertoire of songs alive in almost total isolation for over 20 years, between the last of the family singing sessions and his being 'discovered' by the 1970s' folk scene. 

Walter's uncle, Billy Gee (born 1863), lived with the family for many years and had learned many of his songs from his father, Walter's grandfather, Thomas Cook Gee (born 1827).  In the early 1930s, when the Depression was at its worst and young Walter was finding carpentry jobs few and far between, he and Uncle Billy found themselves with time on their hands: "He worked on the golf course as a groundsman and when times were bad he'd be laid off … We'd sit of an afternoon in one of the sheds.  He'd keep a bottle of something or other under the floorboards and he'd get that out and we'd sit there, the two of us, him singing and me listening.  And that's how I got most of my songs."

4 - Nancy Lee (Roud 5014)
(Recorded by Mike Yates in Walter's home, Knapton, 1978-82.  Track taken from Walter Pardon: Put a Bit of Powder on it, Father MTCD305-6)

Of all the wives that e'er ye know
Ye-ho lads, oh, ye-ho lads, oh
There's none like lovely Nancy Lee, I trow
Ye-ho lads, oh, ye-ho
See, there she'll stand and wave her hand, upon the quay
And every day, when I'm away, she watch for me
And whisper low when tempests blow for Jack at sea
Ye-ho lads, oh, ye-ho.

Chorus:
The sailor's wife the sailor's star shall be
Ye-ho, we go across the sea
The sailor's wife the sailor's star shall be
The sailor's wife his star shall be.

The harbour's past and the breezes blow
'Tis long e'er we come back I know
But true and bright from morn 'til night my home will be
And all so trim and snug and neat for Jack at sea
And Nancy's face to bless the place and welcome me ...

The Bosun pipes the watch below
Then here's a health afore we go
"Here's long, long life to my sweet wife and mates at sea
And keep our bones from Davy Jones where e'er we be
May you all meet a mate as sweet as Nancy Lee ..."

A very unusual song to find in England, since it's an American sailors' song.  Roud has but three instances of it and it only appears to have been collected by Alton C Morris, from a Miss Elsie Surber of Panama City, Florida and published in Folksongs of Florida pp.58-59.  Henry Burstow has its title listed, but we have no way of knowing if his was the same song. 

Whatever - it's a lovely song with a truly gorgeous tune with its extra long measures in the middle lines, and that last verse appeals to all the very worst of my romantic sentimentality, and brings a tear to the eye every single time I listen to it! It is also unusual in that it discusses the sailor's wife in terms that have none of that edge of disparagement or snide humour which so often mars songs of this kind - it seems astonishing that this is the first time it has been published on record.

Wisdom (Wiggy) Smith: was born on 3rd July 1926 in a covered wagon parked on the fields of Filton Common near Bristol - the area now covered by Filton aerodrome. 

As the first boy to be born in his family, he was named after his father, Wisdom (the eldest of a family of ten children), but was nicknamed Wiggy to distinguish him.  In his early years the whole family travelled, mostly around the Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and West Midland areas, sometimes living in tents, but mostly in covered wagons - the horse-drawn caravans they call 'barrel-tops'.  The family had originally come from the New Forest area, which may go towards accounting for the difference in accent between Wiggy and his father and uncles. 

He served in several capacities during the Second World War and was injured by shrapnel, having to spend some time in hospital with his eyes bandaged.  Whilst in the forces, he'd cycle from Oxford up to Leamington or Warwick to see the girl he was to marry, Myra, from another Midlands travelling family.  Wiggy's fine singing meant that, with his brothers-in-law, they would visit different pubs each weekend, and Wiggy would sing with the hat being put round at the end.  "They could drink all night - I couldn't drink.  I used to do all the singing and they used to get all the drink.  They used to go round with the hat - 7 or 8 bob say.  That was enough to last me and my wife a couple of days for food." Later on, Wiggy performed in many of the pubs around Gloucestershire with his two brothers as The Travellers and fondly remembers the enthusiastic reception they used to receive. 

Wiggy has been on the current site, between Cheltenham and Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire for 31 years.  Like many of his contemporaries, most of his travelling was done earlier in his life, and was bounded by Coventry, Warwick, Northampton, down on the fens (March) for the spud picking and back to Cheltenham area again.

Some of Wiggy's children still live in trailers, but the majority don't.  Most of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren have been brought up in houses and have never travelled in the way previous generations did.  Although he is well aware of just how hard the way of a life was for a traveller, he regrets that the Romany way of life is disappearing.  "I've got a hundred-and- twenty-odd grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and none of the young ones - and there weren't many of the older ones - can hardly talk Romany slang."

Jabez (Biggun) Smith and Denny Smith were Wiggy's uncles, two of his father's brothers.  Peter Shepheard, an ex-Stroud lad, returned home for a few weeks in 1967 and met and recorded several members of Gloucester's Brazil family of Gypsies.  Danny Brazil introduced him to Biggun Smith at Beachley Ferry.  Biggun was recognised by the travellers in the Gloucester area as a good singer.

5 - Three Jolly Butcher Boys (Roud 17, Laws L4)
(Recorded by Peter Shepheard from Biggun Smith in The Fisherman bar at Beachley Ferry, Gloucestershire, 3.1.67.  Track taken from Wiggy Smith and other Family Members: Band of Gold MTCD307))

Oh there was three jolly butcher boys,
It was on one market day;
As they was a-driving along my boys,
Now hard as they could tear;
"Oh stop your horse," cried Gilson,
"I've heard a woman scream."

Them woods they searched all over,
'Til a woman I'll behold,
"What brings you here stark naked,
With your hair bound to the ground?"

"Is you put here for a murderer,
Or is you put here for some snare?"
"Them rogues they've rippèd me, they've tored me,
Bound my hair down to the ground.

Oh Johnson being such a valiant man,
And a man of courage bold,
He took his jacket from his back,
Just to keep her from the cold.

Sure as they was a-driving along my boys,
Now hard as they could tear,
"Oh stop your horse," cried robbers,
"You can either fight or die."

"I'll stop my horse," cried robber [Johnson],
"I'll stop my horse," cried he
"For I never was down hearted,
And afraid of any man."

Oh Johnson being such a valiant man,
Oh a man of courage bold,
Oh Johnson drawed his slithering sword,
He slittered them to the ground.

"I got a fall," cried Johnson,
"I got a fall cried he,"
"For it was that villain woman,
Has give me my death wownd."

She was took as a prisoner,
Put behind strong iron bars,
For killing the finest butcher boy,
That trod old England's ground. 

This old ballad has 123 Roud entries, principally from books and collections, yet is still to be found in the living tradition in England and Scotland, and there are 15 sound recordings.  There are also many examples from Canada and the USA, but only two listings for Irish singers.  It is probably founded on an event that took place in 17th century England and was certainly printed in a blackletter broadside in 1678 under the title Three Worthy Butchers of the North.  Of the sound recordings, probably only three remain available: George Fosbury (Folktracks FSA426), Bob Scarce (Folktracks 60-029) and Walter Pardon (Topic TSCD514). 

Biggun starts singing the tune from the previous song he'd sung, realises it and, in the second verse begins to move into the right one (involving a key change) - which is established by the third verse.  This is very characteristic of Traveller singers in general. 

It's a characteristic of songs containing the exploits of named protagonists that these names rarely remain constant.  In this ballad, two of the three butchers have acquired a huge array of the most unlikely sounding names over the centuries, yet hero Johnson remains undiminished in almost every version. 

Daisy Chapman: was the eldest daughter of Mary (née Gill) and John Birnie, was born on the 12th of May 1912, in the same bedroom in which her mother had been born, in the farm croft of Broadleys o' New Pitsligo.  It had been her grandparents' place and, when they moved on, her parents took it over.  Later they moved to the small croft of Quarry Head where Daisy was brought up.  Quarry Head is a few miles inland from the small fishing village of Rosehearty on the northernmost tip of north east Scotland - the Buchan area of Aberdeenshire.  Her given name was Maggie Birnie but she was always known as Daisy.

Her mother and grandmother were both good singers and she inherited many of her older songs from them.  Singing and making music were a normal part of life on the croft at Quarry Head and there would often be musical gatherings with neighbours.  Daisy started singing at a young age and also played piano, and her father and elder brother Charlie played fiddle; they had a family band that played for local barn dances around Rosehearty. 

When she was 17 she married William Chapman, a farmer's son from the neighbouring farm of Ironhill.  They took on a small farm in North Ladiesford near Boyndlie, south of Rosehearty, for a number of years and later they moved to North Broadleys, but Daisy's health deteriorated after nearly three decades of farm work, and they moved to Aberdeen in the early 1950s where William took a job working for Wm Wiseley, who operated steam lorries in the city.  He later worked on the railways.  They had no surviving children, but had "a happy married life ... a few years in Aberdeen together" before William died, quite young, in 1959. 

As seems to be so frequently the case, she had learned her songs from her mother and grandmother as a girl, but more or less stopped once she was married.  She began singing again after her husband's death - at Kirk functions, pensioners' concerts and the like.  In the early 1970s she suffered a heart attack, followed by a heart bypass operation in 1976, and from that time on she never again sang in public. 

6 - Ythanside (Roud 3783; GD 5:951; FSNE 16)
(Recorded by Peter Shepheard at the Aberdeen Folk Festival, October 1968.  Track taken from Daisy Chapman: Ythanside MTCD308)

As I gaed in be Ythanside,
Where gently flows the rollin tide,
A bonnie lass passed by my side,
Her looks to me, an smiled.

Oh but she was a beauty bricht,
That iver trod the braes o' Gight,
I could hae spent a leelang nicht
Wi her on Ythanside.

I turned my back on Fyvie's bells,
An my poor heart gave mony a knell,
An I spiered the wey be Saint John's wells,
An hame be Ythanside.

The maid replied without delay,
She turned tae me an this did say,
"I only go two miles that way,
Young man, I'll tell ye plain."

She took me til her father's hame,
Sae bashfully as we gaed ben,
The auldwife, she took oot a seat,
An bad ma til sit doun.

I sat doon the auld folks tae please,
They treated me wi breid an cheese,
The bairnies aa aroon ma knees,
It wis a blythesome sicht.

Nine o'clock began tae strick,
An I bad them aa a blythe sweet nicht,
An I spiered the wey be Mains o' Gight,
An hame be Ythanside.

She showed me til the barn door,
Oh, but oor twa herts were sore;
We parted there to meet no more,
Wi her on Ythanside.

When he came back it was intae Spring,
An on her finger he placed a ring,
An frae her hame he haes her taen,
On bonnie Ythanside.

Noo this couple's mairried noo,
They've as muckle grund's would keep a coo,
An they hae bairnies - quite a few,
An dwell on Ythanside. 

This lovely song was sung by Daisy Chapman at the Aberdeen Folk Festival Sunday afternoon traditional concert, shortly after returning from her successful first appearance at the Blairgowrie Festival in August.  This was one of Daisy's favourite songs and it was clearly also very popular in the north east at the turn of the century, since there are fourteen versions in the Greig-Duncan Collection and a total of 21 in Roud - all from Scotland.  Gavin Greig considered the song to be fairly recent when he first commented on it in 1905.  However, Daisy's tune is clearly old, and is a beautiful pentatonic melody lacking both the 3rd and 6th of the scale.

Only two other sound recordings are known; by Frank Steele and Jimmy McBeath.  Daisy's will be, we think, the only available recording.

Jim Wilson: was born in 1875, and died of cancer in June 1961, a year after these recordings were made.  He was a miller's roundsman, a railway worker and later a gardener.  He lived with his son's family in Pearson's Road, Three Bridges - it was a real railway town and a lot of them worked there.  Jim had 'a fair repertoire of country song and knows perhaps another hundred fragments' according to Mervyn Plunkett. 

Brian Matthews remembers that he always stood up to sing, usually with a mischievous twinkle in his one good eye.  He also sang Barbara Allen on the EP Four Sussex Singers (Collector LEB 7), 1961. 

7 - Barbara Allen (Roud 54, Child 84)
(Recorded by Brian Matthews at The Plough, Three Bridges , 10.2.60.  Track taken from Just Another Saturday Night - Sussex 1960 MTCD309-10)

In Reading town where I was born
A fair maid was a-dwelling
I picked her up for to be my bride
And her name was Barbara Allen
I picked her up for to be my bride
And her name was Barbara Allen.

It was all in the month of May
Where the green leaves they were a-springing
A young man on his sick-bed lay
For the love of Barbara Allen.

Oh he sent his servant man
To the place where she was a-dwelling
Saying "Fair maid, go to your master's house
If your name is Barbara Allen."

So slowly, slowly she walked by
So slowly she got to him
And when she got to his bedside
She said "Young man, you're dying."

"Oh nothing but death was in your face
All joy has fled-ed from thee
I cannot save you from the grave
So farewell dearest Johnny."

As she was a-walking through the fields
She heard the bells a-ringing
And as they rung they seemed to say
"Hard-hearted Barbara Allen."

As she was a-walking through the street
She saw his corpse a-coming
"You little hearts, come sit him down
And let me gaze all on him."

The more she looked, the more she laughed
And rather she got to him
'Til her friends cried out "For shame,
Hard-hearted Barbara Allen."

"Hard-hearted creature sure I was
To the one that loved me dearly
I wish I had more kinder been
When the time of life was near me."

It was he that died one good day
And she died on the morrow
It was he that died for love
As she have died for sorrow.

It's always nice to hear a good version of Barbara Allen - and this is a really good one, with a fairly full text, and the unusual 'little hearts' line.  The tune skips about from 4/4 to 6/8 in a delightful way and Jim's occasional short lines are just glorious.  A superb performance. 

It is most widely-known ballad I've yet encountered in Steve Roud's Song Index, with an astonishing 802 instances (including 172 sound recordings) listed there.  Needless to say, it's found everywhere English is spoken - though Australia boasts only one version in the Index - and, very unusually, there's even one from Wales ... although it comes from Phil Tanner in that 'little England', the Gower Peninsula. 

Several great versions can be found on CD these days, including Sarah Makem (Topic TSCD668), Jane Turriff (Springthyme SPRCD1038), Bob Hart (Musical Traditions MTCD301-2), Wiggy Smith (Musical Traditions MTCD307), Phoebe Smith (Veteran VT136CD) and a compilation of a verse or two each from Fred Jordan, Jessie Murray, Charlie Wills, May Bennell, Thomas Moran and Phil Tanner on Classic Ballads II (Rounder CD1775).  Joe Heaney also sings it brilliantly on the new MT/Topic double CD The Road from Connemara (TSCD518D). 

Many, though by no means all, versions end with the motif which usually ends the ballad Lord Lovel as well:

Now she was buried by the old church wall
And he a little higher
And from her grave grew a red, red rose
And from his grew sweet briar.
They grew and the grew to the church steeple top
'Til they could grow no higher
And there they formed a true-lovers' knot
And the rose embraced the briar.

Sarah Porter: was born in 1905 and died aged 75 in 1980.  She came from the travelling family of Williams, her mother being a Barton from Rogate in Hampshire.  They travelled extensively in Sussex, Kent, Surrey and Hampshire, following the usual traditional occupations, mainly fruit and hop picking.

She was to marry James (Jim) Porter and to have five children.  Sometime around 1925 they settled in Stoneywood, Greenwoods Lane, Punnetts Town, along with Jim's brothers, second cousin and some other travelling families.  Sarah and Jim lived in a 25 foot showman's waggon with a cut glass skylight.

The men in the Porter family came from Chatham, Kent, where, because of the shortage of work at the time, they falsified their ages to gain entry into the Navy and receive a regular income.  After about ten years, when the land at Stoneywood went into new ownership, they had to move just a few miles down the road to the hamlet of Three Cups. 

Here they settled into a row of small cottages where Jim was able to carry on his scrap metal business.  Jim and Sarah supplemented their by income fruit and hop picking, where Sarah would sing all day long.

8 - The Wind Across the Wild Moor (Roud 155, Laws P21)
(Recorded by Brian Matthews in The Three Cups, Punnetts Town.  Track taken from Just Another Saturday Night - Sussex 1960 MTCD309-10)

"Oh why did I leave my home
To go out in this wide world to roam
If I had have stayed at home
Sure my baby would never been born"

Oh the old man come down in the morn
Found poor Mary dead at his door
With the child still alive at her breast
That was clasped in his dead mother's arms

"Oh father come down let me in
Come down and you open my door
My child at my bosom will die
For the winds do blow 'cross the wild moor"

Sure the old man with silvery hair
Not a voice nor a sound touched his ear
And the old clock did chime in the night
And the winds do blow 'cross the wild moor

For the old man come down in the morn
Found poor Mary dead at his door
With the child still alive at her breast
It was clapped in his dead mother's arms.

Despite there being 155 entries for this song in Roud, it appears to have been recorded from only six singers - although the Delia Murphy and Louvin Brothers' versions are missing from the list.  In Sussex, only the Copper family have been noted as knowing the song, but as Sarah had travelled "all over the country" she could have learned it almost anywhere. 

From the evidence, it appears to be a 19th century English broadside hit which then travelled to America and became far more popular there than in its native land - Edden Hammons played the tune as Mary the Wild Mere in West Virginia in the '30s, (now available on WVU Press SA-2).  Besides Sarah and the Coppers, only Frank Hinchliffe (Yorkshire) and Charlie Hancey (Suffolk) are indicated in Roud as having knows it in England since 1910.

Freda Palmer: came from the village of Leafield, Oxfordshire, although she was living in Witney when Mike Yates met her.  Leafield is, of course, the home of the traditional Field Town Morris and must, once, have had an active singing tradition.  Freda had quite a large repertoire of songs and was very happy to sing, although many of her songs had to be teased out of her memory over quite a period of time.  As a girl, Freda had worked with an aunt making gloves and the pair, to pass the time, they would swap songs, singing to each other across a communal workbench.  All of the songs heard on the CD came originally from Freda's aunt.

9 - The Fox and the Grey Goose (Roud 131)
(Recorded by Mike Yates in Freda's home at Witney, Oxon, 1972.  Track taken from Up in the North, Down in the South MTCD311-2)

A fox jumped up on a moonlight night,
The stars were shining and all things bright.
"Ah-ha", said the fox, "it's a very fine night
For me to go through the town-di-o
For me to go through the town."

The fox when he came to yonders stile
He p(r)icked up his ears and listened awhile.
"Ah-ha", said the fox, "it's but a short mile,
From this to yonder town-di-o
From this to yonder town."

The fox when he came to the farmer's gate,
Who should he see but the farmer's drake.
"I love you well for your master's sake,
But I long to be picking your bones-i-o
But I long to be picking your bones."

The grey goose ran around the stack,
"Ah-ha", said the fox, "you're very fat,
You'll do very well to ride on my back,
From this to yonder town-di-o
From this to yonder town."

The farmer's wife she jumped out of bed
And out of the window she popped her head.
"Oh husband, oh husband, the geese are all dead,
The fox has been through the town-di-o
The fox has been through the town."

The farmer he loaded his pistol with lead,
And shot the old rogue of the fox through the head.
"Ah-ha", said the farmer, "I think you're quite dead,
No more you will trouble the town-di-o
No more you will trouble the town."

The Fox and the Grey Goose is a universally known song - at least in the version popularised by Burl Ives - although, surprisingly, Freda Palmer had never heard of the latter version until Mike mentioned it to her.  A verse of the song appeared in Gammer Gurton's Garland (1810) and it is one of the songs that Sir Walter Scott listed as being a favourite of his childhood.  Many Victorian broadside printers included it in their catalogues, and collectors have found it being sung in many English counties - thus the 117 instances in Roud.  Only Alfred Williams' collection from 'Wassail' Harvey of Cricklade, Wilts, is from Freda's part of the country, as the majority of English versions come from either Sussex or the south west. 

Harry Burgess sings a Sussex version on volume 18 of The Voice of the People (Topic TSCD668), Cyril Biddick a Cornish one (Rounder 1741) and an American version, based on the Burl Ives rendition, can be heard sung by E C Ball of Virginia on High Atmosphere (Rounder CD 0028).

Frank Hinchliffe: was born in 1923 at Fulwood, to the west of Sheffield, and was a farmer for much of his life.  Ian Russell estimated that Frank had a substantial repertoire approaching a hundred songs, plus at least forty local carols.  The songs came originally from his family and his community.  A quiet, introspective singer, his gentle voice almost hid his mastery of vocal story-telling, and his singing had an appealing, almost plaintive quality that reached out to his audience. 

These recordings were made late at night, after Frank had spent the day gathering hay, when he must have been quite tired.  Nevertheless, they do show a true craftsman at work.  Mike Yates thought he was one of the finest singers that he had met, and is pleased that so many of his recordings are once again available. 

10 - The Green Mossy Banks of the Lea (Laws O15.  Roud 987)
(Recorded by Mike Yates in Frank's home near Sheffield, Yorkshire, 1976.  Track taken from Up in the North, Down in the South MTCD311-2)

When first here in this country a stranger,
Curiosity caused me to roam.
Over England I resembled to ramble,
When I left my dear Ireland, my home.
It was there that I beheld a fair damsel,
And I wished in my heart she was mine.
So I bucked up my spirits,
And bid her "Good morning"
And her fair cheeks they did blush like the rose.

Said I, "Your green meadows, they are charming,
And I'll be your guardian if you choose."
Said she, "Kind sir, I need not a guardian,
Young man you're a stranger to me.
But over yonder my father is a-coming,
O'er the green mossy banks o' the Lea."

I waited 'til up came her father,
And I bucked up my courage once more.
Saying, "Aye, if this be your daughter.
She's a beautiful girl I adore.
But by flattering, let no man deceive thee,
Whatsoever the price he might pay.
For there's many a poor girl that's as handsome,
As those with large properties."

"Ten thousand a year is my income,
And a lady, your daughter might be.
She may ride in a chariot with her horses,
O'er the green mossy banks o' the Lea."

They welcomed me home to their cottage,
And soon in wedlock were we.
It were there that I adored sweet Matilda,
On the green mossy banks o' the Lea. 

Certain of Frank's songs, including this one, had an irregular verse pattern and it's interesting to hear how he would adapt the tune to accommodate these irregularities.  Commonly printed on broadsides, the song tells of a remarkably modern young girl, Matilda, who, with her parents, manages to arrange a marriage with a wealthy American (or, in this case, Irishman) who has recently arrived in the country.  There seems to be a difference of opinion among scholars as to whether the song is Irish or English in origin, whether the river is the Lea or Lee.  It has certainly been sung in both countries; Lucy Broadwood described it as 'astonishingly popular among country singers' and there are 77 instances in Roud, of which the large majority are from England, including only four other sound recordings - only Frank and Harry Cox, on Topic TSCD512D, can be heard on CD.

Ray Andrews: was born on 7th January 1922, an only child of David and Ellen.  They lived in central Bristol, in an area which is now known as the location of the City's registry office in the Broadmead shopping centre.

From an early age Ray heard music, since his father played tenor and G banjo, mandolin, concertina, mouth organ, fiddle and phono fiddle.  Ray first learned to play the banjo with his father.  His mother was not known as a musician, but cousins on his mother's side were singers or musicians.

When he left school at the age of 14 he became an apprentice fitter-welder, before signing up with the RAF and saw service in North Africa and Italy.  On his return, he spent his working life fitting pipes and welding metal, often installing industrial boilers and commercial heating, his work taking him to factories and large buildings across the Bristol area.

During the 1920s, dozens of banjo, guitar and mandolin clubs existed across England.  The Bristol BMG club was formed in early 1928, and one of its first members was Harold Sharp, who had played banjo since the early 1900s, and who became Ray's first 'proper' banjo teacher.  Ray played with his father at a BMG meeting in the autumn of 1928, when he would have been barely six years old! Having learnt by ear from his father, he 'had to start all over again' with Harold Sharp.  This was Ray's introduction to the world of the classic finger style banjo, learning from standard musical notation.

He played for much of his life in working class clubs, pubs, family occasions and community events.  His repertoire reflected the context in which he played.  He played in theatres in the last days of 'variety', singalongs in pubs, folk clubs, festivals, with the Bristol BMG Orchestra, concert parties, and for dance bands.  Ray had a physically demanding working life as a fitter-welder; and often after a full day, starting early in the morning, he would go straight out to play until last orders had been called. 

The label 'traditional' musician does not fit easily with him, perhaps because he learnt his classic banjo music from notation.  He learnt most of his other repertoire by ear, however, especially old music hall and 'community' songs of the early 20th century.  Unlike some other classic banjo players, he did not appear to need the notation in performance.  Much of his popular repertoire is of the kind often easily dismissed by those of us weaned on 'folk revival' and/or rock music.  But it could be argued that Ray's music was more 'connected' to the local community than much of the folk club movement.

11 - Grandfather's Clock
(Recorded by Ray Andrews at his home in Fishponds, Bristol.  Track taken from Ray Andrews: Classic English Banjo MTCD314)

Ray shows off his harmonic trickery with this arrangement.

Kevin Mitchell: was born in St Columb's Wells, Derry City, and grew up in Springtown Camp and the Creggan Estate.  From a very early age he was interested in Irish songs, music and dance.  He followed this interest at every opportunity and, while involved in learning the Irish language, an opportunity arose to learn traditional songs first-hand from traditional singers.  Seán Gallagher encouraged him and and introduced him to several of his relatives who gave him ballads which he still sings. 

Later Kevin attended Friday night ballad sessions in Buncrana where he was fortunate to meet a host of singers with good songs, including Corny McDaid, who gave him many fine songs and ballads.  Kevin finally settled in Glasgow in 1969. 

He has continued to search out songs throughout the years and has appeared at many clubs and festivals in Britain, Ireland, Canada and the USA. 

12 - Seán Ó Duibhir a'Ghleanna (Roud 16907)
(Recorded by Rod Stradling in his house in Stroud, Gloucestershire, on 18th-19th March 2000.  Track taken from Kevin and Ellen Mitchell: Have a Drop Mair MTCD315-6)

After Aughrim's great disaster,
When the foe in sooth was master
'Twas you that first rushed in and swam
The Shannon's fearful flood.
And through Slieve Bloch's dark passes
You rove your galloglasses
Although the hungry Saxon wolves
Were howling for our blood.
And as you crossed Tipp'rary
You raised the Clan O'Leary
And drove a creagh before them
As their horsemen onward came.
With our swords and spears we gored them,
As through flood and light we bore them,
Ah, Seán Ó Duibhir a'Ghleanna,
We were worsted in the game. 

Long, long we kept the hillside,
Our couch hard by the rillside,
The sturdy, knotted oaken bough
Our curtain overhead.
The summer's blaze we laughed at,
The winter snows we scoffed at,
And trusted in our long steel swords
To win us daily bread.
'Til the Dutchman's troops came round us,
With fire and sword they bound us,
They fired the hills and mountains
'Til the very clouds were flame.
Yet our sharpened swords cut through them,
In their very hearts we hued them,
Ah, Seán Ó Duibhir a'Ghleanna
We were worsted in the game. 

Here's a health to your and my king,
The monarch of our liking,
And to Sarsfield underneath whose flag
We'll cast once more a chance,
For the morning's dawn will bring us
Across the seas and wing us,
To take our stand and wield a brand
Among the sons of France.
And though we part in sorrow,
Still Seán Ó Duibhir a'chara
Our prayer is God save Ireland
And pour blessings on her name.
May her sons be true when needed,
May they never feel as we did,
Ah, Seán Ó Duibhir a'Ghleanna
We were worsted in the game.

Kevin: An English translation of a Gaelic song; a lament for the defeat of the Irish forces at the battle of Aughrim, 12th July 1691.  The title translates as Seán O'Dwyer of the Glen.  Seán O'Dwyer actually died fighting in Spain.

The only other version we can find of this superb song, sometimes called The Battle of Aughrim, is in Patrick Galvin's Irish Songs of Resistance.

Ellen Mitchell: was born in Glasgow, but left as a very small baby, to live in Kirn, Dunoon and Innellan, along the Clyde Coast.  She returned at the age of seven and have been living there ever since.  As a child she was interested in music - the influences generally were family, school, the community.  She was taught a variety of songs in Primary school and teachers would sometimes encourage her to sing out, which she found a bit embarrassing but also quite enjoyable. 

Various family members had connections with music.  Ellen's father had a passion for classical music and jazz.  Her great aunt used to rattle out tunes on my granny's piano with great exuberance and freedom of spirit, while her uncle was a guitarist and singer in a skiffle group, when skiffle was in its heyday. 

As a teenager she went Youth Hostelling and camping; this broadened her repertoire because she took part in sing-songs in common rooms and round camp fires.  Then there was the Jack Elliot, Derrol Adams, Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie phase.  The discovery of folk clubs and festivals took her further into the music, and she was excited to hear more traditional song.

When Ellen had young children and a demanding full time job it was very difficult to maintain her involvement to a satisfactory level, but I did manage to take part in competitions run by the TMSA and won three of these.  In the past ten years or so, she has had more time to devote to performance and repertoire, and says her enjoyment of singing has greatly increased.

13 - Feein Day (Roud 2516, GD4:883)
(Recorded by Rod Stradling in Ellen's house in Partick, Glasgow, 28.10.01.  Track taken from Kevin and Ellen Mitchell: Have a Drop Mair MTCD315-6)

Twa lads and I stepped fae Milngavie,
To Glasgow town we made our way.
And all along the road was thronged
Wi lads and bonny lasses gay.
While gazing round me I did spy
A fair maid walking by hersel
For fear the rain her dress would stain
She did dispel her umberell. 

I steppit up and said "Fair maid,
How far are you goin this way?"
To Glasgow town sure I am bound,
You know it is the feein day."
Says I "The day looks tae be wet
Although the morning did look fine."
She smiled and said "I'm sore afraid
I'll no be in by feein time."

"Cheer up your heart, my bonny lass,
We'll hae good weather bye and bye,
And don't be sad when wi a lad,
A roving baker fae Milngavy.
And if you will accept a gill
O' whisky, brandy, rum or wine,
A glass we'll hae and then we'll be
In Glasgow Town by feein time.  "

She gave consent and in we went
Intae an alehoos on the way.
Glass after glass, and the time did pass
And baith forgot it was feein day.
The clock struck nine, she smiled on me,
Says "Baker lad the fault is thine.
The night is on and I am from home,
And besides I've lost ma feein time."

"Cheer up your heart, ma bonnie lass,
I do not mean to harm you.
The marriage tie we'll surely cry,
For baker lads they aye prove true."
"I'm ower young to wed a man,
Ma mither she has nain but me,
Yet I'll comply and no deny.
I'll wed afore I tak a fee."

The night was spent in merriment
And we twa wedded fine next day.
And aye ma lass, she does confess,
It was weel to miss the feein day.
Ma love and I we sae agree,
We hae nae cause fae tae complain.
And ilka day she'll smile and say
"I'm glad I missed the feein time."

Ellen: I learned this song from the singing of John Eaglesham of Glasgow - he would say from Govan.  It's a happy love song, although it also reminds us of a the situation when young working class men and women in country areas were feed to an employer, most often a farmer, and paid at the end of their feeing term.  Often the conditions were unknown to the workers and were often unsatisfactory.  They were evaluated like livestock and working conditions were tough, with certainly no sick or holiday pay.  I have a friend, Willie Devine, who remembers standing in line waiting to be chosen for a fee.  In this song the young woman had obviously experienced some difficult fee paid employment, since she would rather be married than 'tak a fee'. 

This delightful song has been found only in Scotland, and all but one of Roud's 21 examples were collected by Gavin Greig or James Duncan - the exception being Jimmy McBeath, who sang it for Peter Hall in 1971, and the recording appeared on his Topic LP Bound to be a Row (12T 303).  It does not seem to have been printed as a broadside, so one may presume that it's of quite recent (turn of the century?) composition.  It is often also known as Glasgow Fair or The Feein Time.

George Dunn: (1887-1975) was born in the Black Country village of Quarry Bank, then in Staffordshire, some eight miles west of Birmingham, and spent most of his long life there.  Both his grandfather, Benjamin, and his father, Sampson worked in the iron trade, as did George himself, who retired at the age of 72 after 59 years, mainly as a chainmaker.

He was brought up in Sheffield Street, in whose hundred houses not a single adult at that time could read or write.  If they passed the Labour Examination, children were allowed to start working half-time at the age of eleven.  George continued full-time at school until he was thirteen, his parents having been impressed by his progress in reading and writing.  Long before he left school, though, he contributed to the family budget by working for half of his two-hour school lunch break "a-blowin'" - that is, pumping the bellows in one of the backyard chainshops which abounded in the village.  His wage was a penny a week, and he also earned a few coppers in the evenings by acting as a barber's lather boy. 

George's first full-time job was as a blower at a wage of 3s.  6d.  for a 59-hour week - less than a penny an hour, since the working day ran from 6 am to 6 pm.  In 1904 he moved to the newly established chainmaking factory of Noah Bloomer and Sons.  His wage rose to 10s.  a week.  By 1913 this had become 18s.  but he judged this too small to marry on, and gave notice.  The firm raised his wage to £1 a week, and he stayed for a further 46 years, the last ten as the superintendent of the proof house.  Spells of hop-picking in Worcestershire and Herefordshire, hard though they were, provided welcome relief as well as supplementary income. 

Again and again, he mentions singing; in the fields, at home, in the pubs - hymns, operatic arias, music hall items, and above all, the traditional songs learned from his father (who was also a champion whistler).  Much of the learning was done literally at his father's knee.

14 - My Father's a Farmer (Roud 16897)
(Recorded by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger in George's home in Quarry Bank, Staffs, 1971.  Track taken from George Dunn: Chainmaker MTCD317-8)

My father's a farmer, constant, true,
And I am his son and a farmer too.
I brew good ale and drink it too,
Hurrah for the life of a farmer. 

(Chorus)
For the old crow starts with a caw, caw, caw,
And the old sheep starts with a baa, baa, baw.
There's a baa, baa, baa and a cluck, cluck, cluck,
And a quack, quack, quack from the old wild duck.
Eee aw, ee aw, is the donkey's bray;
Cock a doodle-do at the break of day,
Hurrah for the life of a farmer. 

My wife has bouncing sisters three,
And they all come down to dinner or tea,
To dine at partridge or pheasantry
Hurrah for the life of a farmer. 

See how they harness the old grey mare,
And ride away to the onion fair,
Or catch a fox or shoot [chase] a hare
Hurrah for the life of a farmer.

George Dunn remembered learning this when he was eight years old, in 1895.  We have seen only two other versions, noted in 1906 by Anne Gilchrist in 1906 under the title of The Farmer's Life from a Mr Coomber, who had learned the song from his grandfather (MS, Vaughan Williams Memorial Library) and another collected about 1918 by Alfred Williams, called Hurrah for the Life of a Farmer.  Michael Kilgarriff, in Sing Us One of the Old Songs, Oxford (1998) gives a song of this name as written by Ted Snow of the Mohawk Minstrels.

Mary Ann Haynes: was almost the first Gypsy singer that the collector and recordist Mike Yates was to meet.  She was born in 1905, in a Faversham waggon parked behind The Coach and Horses in Portsmouth, Hampshire.  Her father, Richard Milest, was a horse-dealer whose family would accompany him across England during the summer as he made his way from fair to fair.  “We used to go to the Vinegar & Pepper Fair at Bristol, then to Chichester, Lewes, Canterbury and Oxford, then up to Appleby and back down to Yalding.”  Mary’s husband died suddenly, leaving her with a large family, and, having settled in Brighton, she worked as a flower-seller, earning enough to support her family.  Mary died in 1977.

15 - Hopping Down in Kent / My Lovely Hops (Roud 1715)
(Sung by Mary Ann Haynes, Brighton.   Track taken from Here's Luck to a Man ... MTCD320)

Now, hopping's just beginning,
We've got our time to spend.
We've only come down hopping,
To earn a quid if we can.

Chorus:
With a tee-i-eh,
Tee-i-eh,
Tee-i-ee-i -eh.

Now, early Monday morning,
The measurer he'll come round.
'Pick your hops all ready
And you'll pick them off'n the ground.'

Now, early Tuesday morning,
The bookie he'll come round.
With a bag o[f] money,
He'll flop it on the ground.
Say[s], 'Do you want some money?'
'Yes, sir, if you please.
To buy a hock of bacon
And a roll o[f] mouldy cheese.'

They all says hopping's lousy.
I believe it's true.
Since I've been down hopping,
I've got a chatt* or two.

Early Saturday morning,
It is our washing day.
We boils 'em in our hopping-pot
And we hangs 'em on the ground.

Hopping's all over.
All the money's spent.
I wish to God I'd never done
No hopping down in Kent.

I say one, I say two
No more hopping shall I do

My lovely hops, my lovely hops,
When the measurer he comes round:
'Pick 'em up, pick 'em up off the ground!'
When he starts to measuring,
He never know when to stop;
'Why don't you jump in the bin
And take the bloomin' lot'.

* chatt = louse, from c.1830s

The hopfields of Kent once attracted a large number of itinerant labourers during the summer picking season (it's all mechanized now, of course). Many families from East London spent their holidays there and it seems likely that the song Hopping Down in Kent came to the fields with the eastenders. The writer George Orwell spent time in the hop-fields and was aware of the song. (See The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell vol.1.p.86. Penguin Books, 1970).
The final verse, about the measurer, refers to the fact that the pickers were paid by the number of baskets that they filled and it was the measurer's job to ensure that the baskets were as full as they could be.

Other recordings: Louise Fuller (Surrey) - Topic TSCD655.  (This recording is credited to Mary Ann Haynes in the CD's booklet. Topic had intended to use Mary's version, but a mistake was made during the editing stage and Louise's version was inadvertently substituted).  Peter Kennedy also recorded it from Phoebe Smith for the BBC in 1956.

L G 'Pug' Allen:Mike Yates, travelling with Paul Brown in the Shenandoah Valley, stayed with Pug Allen and his wife at Stuart's Draft in Augusta County, VA.  He recorded Pug playing fiddle, with his son, George, on guitar and Paul on banjo.

16 - Fire in the Mountains
(Recorded by Mike Yates at Pug's home in Stuart's Draft, Augusta County, VA.  16.8.80.  Track taken from Far in the Mountains: Volumes 1 & 2 MTCD321-2)

Fire in the Mountains is one of a broad family of early nineteenth century (or earlier) tunes that shades into one another and are as old as Hey Betty Martin, Tip Toe.  Sam Connor and Dent Wimmer also used to play it, but under the title Ten Little Indians and Sam had the following verse to the tune:

All my little Indians don't drink liquor,
All my little Indians don't get drunk.

...which is similar to the lines sung by Fiddlin' John Carson in his 1926 recording of the tune (Okeh 45068, reissued on Document DOCD-8017).

It has been suggested that the tune originated from eastern European migrants, some of whom made commercial recordings in New York in the early part of the 20th century.  There is also a Norwegian tune, printed in Southern Folklore Quarterly vol.  vi, number 1 (March, 1942) p.9, that shows some similarity.  A L 'Red' Steeley and J W 'Red' Graham - known as the Red Headed Fiddlers - made a spirited fiddle/banjo recording in 1929 (reissued on Document DOCD-8038) that is well-worth hearing.  For some reason, the engineers titled this recording Far in the Mountain.  (Chances are they were Yankees from the North, unaccustomed to Steeley & Graham's accents).  The Camp Creek Boys, from the area around Galax, VA, play a good version on County CD 2719, as did Theron Hale (reissued on County CD 3522).

Doug Wallin: Doug Wallin's farm lies at the head of Crane Branch, two or three miles away from the settlement of Sodom Laurel.  The path up the cove follows, and often crosses, a rock-strewn stream, which is almost impossible to negotiate by car.  When I first called to see Doug (b.1919) and his mother, Berzilla Wallin, the banks of the stream were covered with the most beautiful milky-blue dwarf iris.  Cecil Sharp called this country, "The most magnificent I have ever seen."

Like his neighbours, Doug grew tobacco and corn and also raised a few animals.  Many of his songs came from his great-aunt, Mary Sands of Allenstand, who sang twenty-five songs, including The House Carpenter, to Sharp.  Cas Wallin, Doug's uncle, did not remember Sharp.  But another uncle, Lloyd Chandler, was only 14 when he gave Sharp a fine version of the ballad of Young Hunting.  Many of Doug's fiddle tunes, including Shoot that Turkey Buzzard, came from Mitchell Wallin, Mary Sands' half-brother, who not only played for Cecil Sharp but who also acted as a chauffeur for the collector.  (For further details of Mary Sands and Mitchell Wallin, see the article A Nest of Singing Birds on the internet magazine Musical Traditions).

Berzilla Wallin may be heard singing Love Has Brought Me to Despair, Johnny Doyle and Conversation With Death on the Folkways LP Old Love Songs and Ballads from the Big Laurel (Folkways 2309), while Doug and his brother Jack also have an album, Family Songs and Stories, out on Smithsonian Folkways SF CD 40013.

17 - McKinley (Roud 787)
(Recorded by Mike Yates in Doug's home at Crane Branch, Madison County, NC, 23.5.83.  Track taken from Far in the Mountains: Volumes 3 & 4 MTCD323-4)

Coming down from Tennessee,
Coming on the run.
Going down to the White House,
Going to get in on the fun.
From Buffalo,
To Washington.

Will he jumped on his horse,
And grabbed in his mane.
Told that old horse,
"You've got to out-run the train.
From Buffalo,
To Washington."

"McKinley, McKinley,
Why didn't you run?
When you saw Zosgo coming,
With an Iver Johnson gun?
Now you've been gone,
A long, long time."

McKinley hollered,
McKinley squalled.
When Doc said, "McKinley,
I can't find the ball.
You're gonna die,
You're gonna die."

Roosevelt in the White House,
He's doing his best.
McKinley in the graveyard,
He's taking his rest.
Yes he's been gone.
A long, long time.

William McKinley (1843 - 1901), 25th President of the USA, was fatally shot on September 6th, 1901, by Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist factory worker, while visiting the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo.  Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers recorded an influential version of the song in 1926 (White House Blues reissued on County CO-CD 3501) and the Carter Family's 1930 Cannonball Blues, on Victor V-40317 (reissued on JSP CD7701B), was also influential.  A detailed listing of related tunes can be found in White House Blues - McKinley Cannonball Blues by Neil V Rosenberg in the John Edward's Memorial Foundation Newsletter, IV:2, no.10 (June, 1968).

Cas Wallin: was one of Doug Wallin's uncles.  Many of the songs that Cas and Doug sang were similar to those that Sharp collected from the singer Mary Sands, who was, in fact, the half-sister of Cas's father, Thomas Wallin.  Cas had farmed for most of his life but was more or less retired when Mike Yates met him and his wife, Vergie.  They lived close-by to Evelyn and Douston Ramsey and Mike was sorry not to have been able to spend more time with them.  At one time Cas led the singing in his local Church of God.  Cas can also be heard singing Pretty Saro and Fine Sally on Folkways LP 2309.

18 - Pretty Fair Miss all in her Garden (Laws N42, Roud 264)
(Recorded by Mike Yates at Cas's home in Sodom Laurel, Madison County, NC, 27.8.80.  Track taken from Far in the Mountains: Volumes 3 & 4 MTCD323-4)

Spoken: This is an old love ballad song, Pretty Fair Miss All in the Garden... in her Garden.

A pretty fair miss all in her garden,
A very fine soldier come riding by.
It's he stepped up and thus he 'dressed her,
Said, "My pretty fair miss, will you marry me?"

"Oh no, kind sir, a man of honour"
Says, "A man of honour you may be.
How can you impose on a fair young lady,
Who never intends your bride to be?"

"I have a true-lover gone to the army,
And he's been gone for seven years long.
But if he stays a seven years longer,
No man on earth could marry me."

"Pre-haps your lover's drownd-ed in the ocean.
Pre-haps he's in some battlefield slain.
Pre-haps he's taken another girl and married."
"I'd just love that girl that'd marry him."

His fingers being long and slender,
All from his pockets he brought his hand.
Says, "Here's a ring that you did give me,
Before I started to the war."

She threw her lily white arms around him,
And prospered (prostrate?) at his feet did fall.
Says, "You're the man that used to court me,
Before you started to the war."

"Yes I've been on the deep sea sailing,
And I've been sailing for seven years long.
But if I'd have stayed there seven years longer,
A-no girl on earth could have married me."

Pretty Fair Miss All in her Garden is an Old World broadside ballad that was popular with 19th century printers like Catnach and Such.  G Malcolm Laws also lists a number of American broadsides.  It's a popular piece, said by some to be descended from the classic ballad of Hind Horn.  Often, the ring has been broken before the lover's separation and the soldier/sailor is able to match his half of the ring with that kept by the maiden, a motif that also occurs in Homer's Odyssey.

The rumbling that can sometimes be heard in the background to this recording is not, as one reviewer thought, a fault with the microphone; but is the sound of a thunderstorm that was echoing around the surrounding hills.

A version that Mike collected from the Sussex singer Mabs Hall can be heard on the Veteran Tapes cassette The Horkey Load - Volume 2 (VT109), whilst other American recordings can be heard sung by Cas's nephew Doug Wallin (Smithsonian Folkways SF CD 40013), by Wavie Chappell (Augusta Heritage cassette 009), by Corbett Grigsby & Martin Young of Kentucky (Smithsonian Folkways SFCD 40077) and by Tom Ashley of Tennessee (Smithsonian Folkways SFCD 40097).  Mary Cash, an Irish traveller then living in London, has a fine version on the cassette Early in the Month of Spring (EFDSS VWML 001), and Daisy Chapman has a rather different one called Poor and Single Sailor on Ythanside (Musical Traditions MTCD308).

Benton Flippen: was born in 1920 and was first influenced as a fiddler by an uncle from Thomasville, NC, who would occasionally visit his parent's home.  From 1948 onwards Benton played on WPAQ, a local radio station, often in company with Esker Hutchins who taught him many local tunes.  Other influences include Fiddlin' Arthur Smith (heard on the radio) and local banjo-player Kyle Creed.  Benton currently has a fine CD out on Rounder (CD 0326).

19 - Gary Dawson's Tune
(Played on the banjo by Benton Flippen and the guitar by Larry Flippen.  Recorded by Mike Yates at Benton's home in Toast, Surry County, NC.  7.5.83.  Track taken from Far in the Mountains: Volumes 3 & 4 MTCD323-4)

At 2 o'clock one morning, the party all but over, Benton Flippen put down his fiddle, and taking hold of Paul Brown's banjo, began to show those of us who were left how Gary Dawson, a one-time neighbour, used to play two-finger style tunes.  A later recording, on the Rounder CD mentioned above, gives this tune the title Salt River.

Before 1973, we had no idea there were so many Irish travellers living in London and the outskirts.  We were amazed at the many caravan sites we found, often in the most unlikely places, and at the large number of singers, nearly all young, and at the size and content of their repertoires of traditional song.  Until that time, the relative isolation of travelling life meant that, while traditional singing was in decline, it was in better condition than within most settled communities.

Mary Delaney: originally from Co Tipperary, moved from west to east, right across London and even into various flats from time to time in order to give her children a better education.  A lovely singer, mother of sixteen children and blind from birth, Mary has an enormous repertoire of outstanding songs and ballads that she has known since childhood, as well as a store of humorous yarns that gave us many hours of pleasure.

20 - What Will We Do when We'll Have No Money? (Roud 16879)
(Mary Delaney.  Track taken from From Puck to Appleby, MTCD325-6)

What will we do when we’ll have no money?
All true lovers, what will we do then?
Only hawk through the town for a hungry crown
And we’ll yodel it over again.

What will I do if I’d marry a tinker?
All true lovers, what will we do then?
Only sell a tin can and walk on with me man,
And we’ll yodel it over again.

What will we do if we marry a soldier?
All true lovers, what will we do then?
Only handle his gun and we’ll fight for the fun,
And we’ll yodel it over again.

What will we do if we have a young daughter?
All true lovers, what would we do then?
Only take it in hand and walk on with me man,
And we’ll yodel it over again.

We have not found this song elsewhere, either in print or in a recording, but it bears such a striking resemblance to Mrs Elizabeth Cronin’s What would you Do if you Married a Soldier (Roud 3051) that it is probably a traveller’s remake of the same song.  Mary has a number of similar pieces: I’ve Buried Three Husbands Already and If Ever You Go to Kilkenny, etc., and, despite the fact that her speciality is the long, free ballad, she takes great pleasure in singing these made-up snatches and often is not able to finish them for laughing.  On another occasion, Mary gave us this alternative to verse four:

What will we do when we’ll have a young daughter,
All true lovers, what will we do then,
Bring it on on my back and walk on for the crack,
And we’ll yodel it over again.

Other CDs: Elizabeth Cronin (What Would You Do if You Married a Soldier) - Rounder 1742.

Of the Travellers on these CDs, we were lucky in first meeting ‘Pop’s’ Johnny Connors, a man whose contacts with non-Travellers included Jeremy Sandford, to whose book, Gypsies, Johnny had contributed a chapter.  He made us welcome and introduced us to several fine singers including his brother-in-law, Bill Cassidy.  At that time, ‘Pop’s’ Johnny, together with Bill Cassidy, Mary Cash, Andy Cash and many more, were camped illegally under the Westway flyover in North Kensington.

21 - Mowing the Hay (Roud 16878)
(Andy Cash.  Track taken from From Puck to Appleby MTCD325-6)

As I went down to Dublin on the first day in May
I’d me hook under me shoulder oh,
To mow down the hay;
When the lassies, they saw me coming, oh,
Them all takes the cry;
“Who's the handsome young fine boy
For to mow down the hay?”

Oh, the moment I landed, I was not long there,
Then the farmer he hired me one thousand a year.
We'll have bold wine and brandy
And good whiskey and beer,
Whilst the money it will hold out,
We'll make the old tap-room shake,
And we all will be happy round the bold Callan Rí.*

Oh me daddy and mammy, oh,,
They both give consent
For to leave down the money, be married we went,
We'll have bold wine and brandy
And some whiskey and beer,
Whilst the money it will hold out
We'll make the old tap-room shake,
And we all will be happy around the bold Callan Rí.

[* Callan Rí : possibly Callan, ten miles south west of Kilkenny city, which stands on The Kings River, Rí being the Irish for king.  It has also been suggested that it might be the Bog of Callary in Co Wicklow]

Working terms like mowing, scything, ploughing and reaping regularly appear in songs as sexual metaphors.  The mower, An Spealadóir in Irish, often turns up as a virile migratory worker who mows the meadows for various maidens and widows.  Typical of the genre is the song that appeared on broadsides as The Mower, a version of which was collected by Henry Hammond from H Hooper of Byer in Dorset in 1907, entitled The Buxom Lass.

Andy’s song does not have the double meaning but does seem to be a celebration of youth and virility.  It may have lost its symbolic aspect along with some verses as it is probably part of a longer song, though we have been unable to find any other versions of it.  He learned it from his father and described it as ‘me daddy’s favourite song’.

Ref: The Wanton Seed, Frank Purslow, EFDSS Publications Ltd, 1968.

Philip McDermott: was born in 1932 in the house where he lives now in Newtownbutler, Co Fermanagh.  His father was a farm labourer and Philip was a general labourer in quarries and on the roads.  His mother sang a few songs and, in her day, she was asked out to friends' houses for sing-song evenings, when there was also fiddle and accordeon music and dances like the old-time waltz.

Philip learned The Reaping of the Rushes Green from his mother.  "My mother." he said, "was a notable singer of that one ...  Any party that was about here, they used to get her up into the houses to sing this song.  People tells me that I can't sing it nearly the way she could sing it."

22 - The Reaping of the Rushes Green (Roud 3380)
(Philip McDermott, Newtownbutler, Co Fermanagh, 6.8.80.  Track taken from The Hardy Sons of Dan, MTCD329-0)

As I walked out one morning,
It being in the merry month of May,
Me and my two white beagles,
Hoping to find some game to kill.
When I spied no one but Mary;
She appeared to me like a virgin queen,
She being at her daily labour
At the reaping of her rushes green.

She says.  “Young man, be easy!
Go on your way, aye, and let me be.
Do not toss or spoil my rushes.
Hard labour I have toiled by thee.”
“If I toss or spoil them carelessly,
A far greener bunch I'll reap for thee.
So sit you down beside me;
Some pleasant stories I'll tell thee.”
“I know it's hard to refuse thee,
Although you might lead me astray,
So I'll sit down beside you
‘Til the morning dew melts fast away.”

As my love and I sat courting,
It being 'neath yon green laurel tree,
And the small birds sang melodiously,
Changing their notes from tree to tree.
The larks sang loud in chorusly
While I embraced my virgin queen,
Mary, my love Mary
And her bonny bunch of rushes green.

Since my love and I got married,
Great riches she has gained by me.
She has servants to attend her
And to keep her from all slavery.
Her waist grew long and slender.
This whole wide world I'd reign for her,
For Mary, my love Mary
And her bonny bunch of rushes green.

This song was included on the Voice of the People volume on hunting songs; however - except for the incidental mention of beagles in the first verse - it has nothing whatever to do with hunting or poaching!  It almost goes without saying that any song which includes the phrase ‘reaping of the rushes green’ has nothing whatsoever to do with rushes either! ‘Green rushes’ almost always refers to virginity/purity, and this is certainly the meaning in this song.  Paddy Tunney also used to sing it.

Phil McDermott can also be heard on To Catch a Fine Buck was My Delight, VotP Topic TSCD668

Maggie Murphy: was born in Tempo, Co Fermanagh, and has lived in and around that area all her life.  Her singing was first recorded for the BBC in 1952 by Seán O'Boyle and Peter Kennedy at the house of Mr Bob Woods at Bellyreragh where she was working in service.  "Sean was married to the daughter of Mrs Woods and he had heard that I sang while I was milking the cows and coming away from work."

Maggie spent her working life in service so it's maybe not surprising that she has several songs which feature serving maids/boys.  Maggie says of her days in service, "That time you were hired at a hiring fair.  Tempo fair wasn't a hiring fair - Trillick was a hiring fair and Enniskillen was a hiring fair.  It was 10th of May and 10th of November, every six months and you worked then for six months in a place and if you left before the six months then they kept your wages.  So you had to stay there whether you were starved or not.”

“My father was a good singer surely, but he wasn't as good a singer as my mother and you could never learn a song from him, but I learned the whole songs from my mother singing them, and that was at home.  She'd sing them, then I'd sing along with her.  Then if I'd get them wrong she'd write them down for me.  She got her songs from her mother, but I never knew my Grannie.”

23 - Willie-O (Roud 273, Laws K12)
(Maggie Murphy, Tempo, Co Fermanagh, 1982.  Track taken from The Hardy Sons of Dan, MTCD329-0)

Oh early, early all in the spring,
When my love Willie went to serve the King,
The storm high and the wind did blow,
Which parted me from my sailor boy.

It's get for me, love, a small wee boat,
That it’s on the ocean I mean to float,
From the lowlands low to the mainland sky,
That I might enquire for my sailor boy.

She just passed by one league or two,
When she met a captain with his ship crew.
Saying, “Captain, captain, come tell me true,
Does my love Willie sail on board with you?”

“What kind of hair has your Willie dear?
What kind of clothes does your Willie wear?”
“He wears a suit of the Royal blue.
And you'll know him by his heart so true.”

“Oh no, my dear, your Willie is not here,
For he was drown-ded last night I fear.
In yon green island as we passed by,
It was there we lost your fine sailor boy.”

She wrang her hands and she tore her hair.
Like a lady that's raked it in deep despair.
Saying, “Ha, ha, ho, what shall I do?
How shall I live when my Willie's gone?”

For she sat down for to write a song.
She wrote it broad and she wrote it long.
At every line she dropped a tear
And at every verse she cries, “Willie dear.”

It's dig my grave both long and deep.
Put a marble headstone at my head and feet.
And on my breast put a cream white dove,
For to show the world that I died for love.

Roud’s 112 instances show this to have been a pretty popular ballad, both in these islands and North America - and until fairly recently, too, if his 39 sound recordings are any indication.  Practically every book and journal available seems to have a version but, strangely, only three broadside printings are to be found in the Index.

Ollie Conway: Back in 1973, when we were camping at Spanish Point, we were fortunate to find our way out to Conway’s Bar in Mullagh and meet Ollie Conway.  Singer, dancer, farmer and publican, Ollie was the first person we recorded in Clare.  The amazingly warm welcome Ollie gave to two complete strangers was a great confidence booster which gave us the courage to continue.  He sang for us without hesitation and encouraged others in the bar to do the same.  Today, Ollie at 82 is still singing, though his renowned set-dancing prowess would probably be a little too much for his pacemaker now.

24 - Banks of Sullane (Roud 9718)
(Ollie Conway, Mullagh, 1973.  Track taken from Around the Hills of Clare, MTCD331-2)

It was early on a bright harvest morning
I strayed by the banks of Sullane,
To gaze on the beauties of nature
That grace every woodland and lawn.
The prospect was surely entrancing
As gay lassies in juvenile bloom
Promenaded by the banks of that river
That flows near the town of Macroom.

I being airy and fond of recreation
To the riverside I ventured to roam,
'Til weary of my ramblings and rovings
I sat myself down by a grove.
I sat there some time meditating
'Til the sun her bright rays had withdrawn,
And a damsel of a queenly appearance
Came down by the banks of Sullane.

I rose with great joy and emotion
And accosted this vision so fair,
Who appeared to me like a Venus
Adorned with jewels most rare.
Were I ruler of France or of Prussia
Sure, ‘tis with me you’d soon wear the crown,
And I’d join you in wedlock, my darling;
You’re the beauty on sweet Masseytown.

We walked and we talked on together,
Inhaling the bright pleasant air,
Until in a voice unaffected,
She said, “See, my father lives there.”
His presence to me was appalling,
With his cross angry looks and his frown
That pierced through my heart like an arrow,
On my way down to sweet Masseytown.

But now I’m retired from my rovings
With a heart full of sorrow and grief.
There is no one on earth to console me
Or to give me a moment’s relief.
I will rove through the African desert
Until death summons me to my tomb,
For the sake of my charming fair Helen
That I met in the town of Macroom.

This is said to be one of the most popular English language ballads of the Ballyvourney and Coolea area in West Cork.  Ollie couldn’t remember where he learned it but, of the only two versions available in print, it most strongly resembles the set given in Tomás O Canainn’s published collection of County Cork songs.  Elizabeth Cronin’s grandson Seán wrote about the song, ‘The poet Aherne from Clondruhid composed this, I think’.

Tom Lenihan: (1905-1990) has an amazing memory and, on a number of occasions, after a little probing, faultlessly remembered and sang a song which he said he had not sung for some 40 years or more and had forgotten he ever knew.

There was always a warm welcome from Tom and Margaret Lenihan in their small thatched farmhouse in Knockbrack, just outside Miltown Malbay.  Tom would talk and sing for visitors at any time, regardless of any farm work he had planned to do.  He had a very large repertoire and positive ideas about singing.  He insisted that the story was most important aspect; the singer’s involvement with the song was paramount.  To him it was vital that the singer used speech patterns, made sense of the words, singing them as close as possible to the way one would speak; to fit the tune to the words, not to make the words fit the tune.  One can appreciate why Tom had so many narrative songs in his repertoire; his attitude to singing is illustrated on the two tracks of speech.

A selection of Tom’s songs, recorded by Tom Munnelly, was published in book form in 1994 by Comhairle Bhéaloideas Éireann entitled Mount Callan Garland, accompanied by a double cassette.  An earlier album of our recordings of him was released by Topic Records in 1978 under the title Paddy’s Panacea.  Tom Lenihan also had a large store of folklore, much of which was also recorded by Tom Munnelly for the Department of Irish Folklore, UCD.

25 - The Croppy Boy (Roud 1030, Laws J14)
Tom Lenihan, Knockbrack, 1977.  Track taken from Around the Hills of Clare, MTCD323-4)

Was early, early on the month of Spring,
When small birds whistled and sweetly did sing,
Changing their notes from tree to tree,
And the song they sung was ‘Old Ireland Free’.

‘Twas early, early on a Thursday night,
The yeomen cavalry gave me a fright,
The yeomen cavalry was my downfall,
And taken I was by Lord Cornwall.

‘Twas in his guardhouse I was laid,
And in his parlour I was tried;
My sentence passed and my spirits low,
And to New Geneva I was forced to go.

As I was marching through Wexford streets,
The drums and fifes, they played so sweet;
The drums and fifes did so sweetly play,
And to New Geneva I was forced away.

As I was marching past my father’s door,
My brother Willie stood on the floor;
My aged father did grieve full sore,
And my tender mother, her hair she’s tore.

As I was marching o’er Wexford Hill,
Who would blame me to cry my fill?
I looked behind and I looked before,
But my tender mother I seen no more.

‘Twas for old Ireland this young man died,
And in old Ireland his body lies;
And ye young people that do pass by
Say, “The Lord have mercy on the Croppy Boy.”

Spoken: That’s the old version of The Croppy Boy too, Jim.  I got that from Willie Clancy’s old aunt, Mrs Jim Haren above at Clooneyogan, years and years ago when I was a young lad like Thomas there.

The term Croppy is popularly believed to refer to the custom, followed by participants of the 1798 rebellion, of wearing their hair cut short to show support for the French Revolution.  However, poet and playwright Patrick Galvin put forward a number of other, equally convincing explanations, which included the practice of punishing convicted felons by cutting off the tops of their ears, and a form of torture applied to rebels known as ‘pitch cap’.  He suggested that a true explanation probably lay in a combination of these.

New Geneva was a military barracks near the village of Passage, Co Waterford, which was used as a prison and torture-house during the rebellion.  The name derives from an abortive project some fifteen years earlier, to build a city there for émigré intellectuals and watchmakers from Geneva.

Packie Manus Byrne: Was born in Co Donegal, but lived in England for many years.  Packie had picked up both songs in Donegal, but, like many of his forbears, he had sought work in England and had been happy to share his songs with an English audience.

26 - Poor Dog Tray (Roud 2668) Packie Manus Byrne, London , 1975.  Track taken from The Birds Upon the Tree, MTCD333)

On the green banks of Shannon,
Where Sheelagh was nigh.
No blithe Irish lad
Was so happy as I. 
No harp, like my own
Could so cheerfully play,
Wherever I went with
My poor dog Tray.

Poor dog he was faithful,
And kind to be sure.
He constantly loved me
Although I was poor.
And when sour-looking folks
Turned me heartless away,
I had always a friend
In my poor dog Tray.

When at last I was forced from
My Sheelagh to part.
She said, whilst this sorrow
Was deep in her heart,
‘Remember your Sheelagh
When you’re far, far away,
And be kind, my dear Pat,
To your poor dog Tray.

When the nights they were dark
And the winds blowing cold’
Pat and his dog
Were growing weary and old.
How snugly we slept
In our old coat of grey’
And he licked me through kindness
My poor dog Tray.

Though my wallet was scant
I remembered his kiss,
Nor refused my last crisp
To his pitiful face.
But he died at my feet
On a cold winter’s day,
And I played a lament
For my poor dog Tray.

Where now can I go
Poor, forsaken and blind?
Can I find one to guide me
So faithful and kind?
To my own native village
So far, far away,
I can never return
With my poor dog Tray.

Poor Dog Tray was written by the Scottish poet Thomas Campbell (1777-1844), who was equally adept at writing ‘Irish’ songs.  At least twenty English broadside printers issued the song, although I know of no versions collected in England prior to this recording.  It appeared in Healy’s Old Irish Street Ballads, vol 3.  Campbell also wrote The Exile of Erin (Roud 4355) which was also popular with English printers.

Article MT131