Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England Part 46

And a begging we will go, we'll go, we'll go; And a begging we will go!

Footnotes:

{1} This is the same tune as Fortune my foe.--See Popular Music of the Olden Time, p. 162.

{2} This word seems to be used here in the sense of the French verb mettre, to put, to place.

{3} The stall copies read 'Gamble bold.'

{4} In the Roxburgh Collection is a copy of this ballad, in which the catastrophe is brought about in a different manner. When the young lady finds that she is to be drowned, she very leisurely makes a particular examination of the place of her intended destruction, and raises an objection to some nettles which are growing on the banks of the stream; these she requires to be removed, in the following poetical stanza:-

'Go fetch the sickle, to crop the nettle, That grows so near the brim; For fear it should tangle my golden locks, Or freckle my milk-white skin.'

A request so elegantly made is gallantly complied with by the treacherous knight, who, while engaged in 'cropping' the nettles, is pushed into the stream.

{5} A tinker is still so called in the north of England.

{6} This poor minstrel was born at the village of Rylstone, in Craven, the scene of Wordsworth's White Doe of Rylstone. King was always called 'the Skipton Minstrel;' and he merited that name, for he was not a mere player of jigs and country dances, but a singer of heroic ballads, carrying his hearers back to the days of chivalry and royal adventure, when the King of England called up Cheshire and Lancashire to fight the King of France, and monarchs sought the greenwood tree, and hob-a-n.o.bbed with tinkers, knighting these Johns of the Dale as a matter of poetical justice and high sovereign prerogative. Francis King was a character. His physiognomy was striking and peculiar; and, although there was nothing of the rogue in its expression, for an honester fellow never breathed, he might have sat for Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell.'

He combined in a rare degree the qualities of the mime and the minstrel, and his old jokes, and older ballads and songs, always ensured him a hearty welcome. He was lame, in consequence of one leg being shorter than the other, and his limping gait used to give occasion to the remark that 'few Kings had had more ups and downs in the world.' He met his death by drowning on the night of December 13, 1844. He had been at a 'merry-making' at Gargrave, in Craven, and it is supposed that, owing to the darkness of the night, he mistook the road, and walked into the river. As a musician his talents were creditable; and his name will long survive in the village records. The minstrel's grave is in the quiet churchyard of Gargrave. Further particulars of Francis King may be seen in Dixon's Stories of the Craven Dales, published by Tasker and Son, of Skipton.

{7} This is the ancient way of spelling the name of Reading. In Percy's version of Barbara Allen, that ballad commences 'In Scarlet town,' which, in the common stall copies, is rendered 'In Redding town.' The former is apparently a pun upon the old orthography-- REDding.

{8} The sister of Roger.

{9} This gentleman was Mr. Thomas Petty.

{10} We here, and in a subsequent verse, find 'daughter' made to rhyme with 'after;' but we must not therefore conclude that the rhyme is of c.o.c.kney origin. In many parts of England, the word 'daughter' is p.r.o.nounced 'dafter' by the peasantry, who, upon the same principle, p.r.o.nounce 'slaughter' as if it were spelt 'slafter.'

{11} Added to complete the sense.

{12} That is, 'said he, the wild boar.'

{13} Scott has strangely misunderstood this line, which he interprets -

'Many people did she KILL.'

'Fell' is to knock down, and the meaning is that she could 'well'

knock down, or 'fell' people.

{14} Went.

{15} The meaning appears to be that no 'wiseman' or wizard, no matter from whence his magic, was derived, durst face her. Craven has always been famed for its wizards, or wis.e.m.e.n, and several of such impostors may be found there at the present day.

{16} Scott's MS. reads Ralph, but Raphe is the ancient form.

{17} Scott reads 'brim as beare,' which he interprets 'fierce as a bear.' Whitaker's rendering is correct. Beare is a small hamlet on the Bay of Morecambe, no great distance, as the crow files, from the locale of the poem. There is also a Bear-park in the county of Durham, of which place Bryan might be an inhabitant. Utrum horum, &c.

{18} That is, they were good soldiers when the MUSTERS were--when the regiments were called up.

{19} Fierce look.

{20} Descended from an ancient race famed for fighting.

{21} a.s.saulted. They were, although out of danger, terrified by the attacks of the sow, and their fear was shared by the kiln, which began to smoke!

{22} Watling-street, the Roman way from Catterick to Bowes.

{23} Lost his colour.

{24} Scott, not understanding this expression, has inserted 'Jesus' for the initials 'I. H. S.,' and so has given a profane interpretation to the pa.s.sage. By a figure of speech the friar is called an I. H. S., from these letters being conspicuously wrought on his robes, just as we might call a livery-servant by his master's motto, because it was stamped on his b.u.t.tons.

{25} The meaning here is obscure. The verse is not in Whitaker.

{26} Warlock or wizard.

{27} It is probable that by guest is meant an allusion to the spectre dog of Yorkshire (the Barguest), to which the sow is compared.

{28} Hired.

{29} The monastery of Gray Friars at Richmond.--See LELAND, Itin., vol. iii, p. 109.

{30} This appears to have been a cant saying in the reign of Charles II. It occurs in several novels, jest books and satires of the time, and was probably as unmeaning as such vulgarisms are in general.

{31} A cake composed of oatmeal, caraway-seeds, and treacle. 'Ale and parkin' is a common morning meal in the north of England.

{32} We have heard a Yorkshire yeoman sing a version, which commenced with this line:-

' It was at the time of a high holiday.'

{33} Bell-ringing was formerly a great amus.e.m.e.nt of the English, and the allusions to it are of frequent occurrence. Numerous payments to bell-ringers are generally to be found in Churchwarden's accounts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.--CHAPPELL.

{34} The subject and burthen of this song are identical with those of the song which immediately follows, called in some copies The Clown's Courtship, sung to the King at Windsor, and in others, I cannot come everyday to woo. The Kentish ditty cannot be traced to so remote a date as the Clown's Courtship; but it probably belongs to the same period.

{35} The common modern copies read 'St. Leger's Round.'

{36} The common stall copies read 'Pan,' which not only furnishes a more accurate rhyme to 'Nan,' but is, probably, the true reading.

About the time when this song was written, there appears to have been some country minstrel or fiddler, who was well known by the sobriquet of 'Pan.' Frequent allusions to such a personage may be found in popular ditties of the period, and it is evidently that individual, and not the heathen deity, who is referred to in the song of Arthur O'Bradley:-

'Not Pan, the G.o.d of the swains, Could e'er produce such strains.'--See ante, p. 142.

{37} A correspondent of Notes and Queries says that, although there is some resemblance between Flora and Furry, the latter word is derived from an old Cornish term, and signifies jubilee or fair.

{38} There is another version of these concluding lines:-

'Down the red lane there lives an old fox, There does he sit a-mumping his chops; Catch him, boys, catch him, catch if you can; 'Tis twenty to one if you catch him or Nan.'