SHROPSHIRE BALLAD.
Your correspondent B. H. C. (Vol. viii., p. 614.) gives, from recollection, a Northamptonshire version of the old "Ballad of Sir Hugh of Lincoln." It reminded me of a similar, though somewhat varied, version which I took down, more than forty years ago, from the lips of a nurse-maid in Shropshire. It may interest the author of The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon, to know that it was recited in the place of his birth. Its resemblance to the ballad in Percy's Reliques was my inducement to commit it to paper:
It hails, it rains, in Merry-Cock land,
It hails, it rains, both great and small,
And all the little children in Merry-Cock land,
They have need to play at ball.
They toss'd the ball so high,
They toss'd the ball so low,
Amongst all the Jews' cattle
And amongst the Jews below.
Out came one of the Jews' daughters
Dressed all in green.
"Come, my sweet Saluter,
And fetch the ball again."
"I durst not come, I must not come,
Unless all my little playfellows come along,
For if my mother sees me at the gate,
She'll cause my blood to fall."
She show'd me an apple as green as grass,
She show'd me a gay gold ring,
She show'd me a cherry as red as blood,
And so she entic'd me in.
She took me in the parlour,
She took me in the kitchen,
And there I saw my own dear nurse
A picking of a chicken.
She laid me down to sleep,
With a Bible at my head, and a Testament at my feet;
And if my playfellows come to quere for me,
Tell them I am asleep.
S. P. Q.