Why fair maid in every feature,
Are such signs of fear expressed,
Can a wandering wretched creature,
With such horror fill thy breast.
Do my frenzied looks alarm thee,
Trust me, sweet, thy fears are vain,
Not for Kingdom would I harm thee,
Shun not then poor crazy Jane.
Fondly my young heart believed him,
Which was doomed to love but one;
He sighed, he vowed, and I believed him,
He was false, and I’m undone.
From that hour has reason never,
Had her empire o’er my brain,
Henry fled, with him for ever
Fled the wits of Crazy Jane.
“It was Christmas morning—dear Christmas morning
When bright angels and men kept watch for its dawning—
And merrily Christmas bells were out ringing,
And blithely the children their carols were singing—
’Twas a hundred years agone—or more.”
From time immemorial the ballad singer, with his rough and ready broad-sheet, has travelled over the whole surface of the country in all seasons and weathers, yet there was one time of the year, however, when he went out of his every-day path and touched on deeper matters than accidents, politics, prize fights, sporting matches, murders, battles, royalty, famous men and women. Christmas time brought, both to him and his audience, its witness of the unity of the great family of heaven and earth, its story of the life and death of Him in whom that unity stands. Several examples, of Christmas carols and Scripture-sheets, bearing Catnach’s imprint lie before us, thanks to the kindness of Mr. W. S. Fortey, Catnach’s successor; these broadsides bear several distinctive marks which show that it was an object of more than ordinary care to publishers and ballad singers. In the first place, these Christmas sheets are double the size of the ordinary broad-sheet—measuring 30 inches by 20—and contain four or five carols—generally one long narrative ballad, and three or four short pieces. Each of them having two or three large woodcuts and several of smaller sizes, and having the following distinctive titles—The Trial of Christ. Faith, Hope, and Charity. Our Saviour’s Love. The Tree of Life. The Crucifixion. The Saviour of Mankind. The Messiah. The Harp of Israel. The Saviour’s Garland. Divine Mirth. And The Life of Joseph, to which is appended:—
LONDON: PRINTED AND SOLD BY
J. CATNACH, 2, MONMOUTH COURT, 7, DIALS,
WHERE MAY BE HAD THE FOLLOWING SHEETS, WITH CUTS.
The Last Day, Our Saviour’s Letter, The Son of Righteousness, Travels of the Children of Israel, Glory of Solomon, The Morning Star, The Noble Army of Martyrs, Christmas Gambols, The Hertfordshire Tragedy, and a Variety of Others are in a state of forwardness for the Press.
“Looking at these Christmas broad-sheets,” says the writer of an article on street-ballads, in the “National Review,” for October, 1861, “it would really seem as if the poorest of our brethren claimed their right to higher nourishment than common for their minds and souls, as well as for their bodies, at the time of year when all Christendom should rejoice. And this first impression is confirmed when we examine their contents. In all those which we have seen, the only piece familiar to us is that noble old carol ‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night,’ where the rest come from, we cannot even conjecture; but in the whole of them there is not one which we should wish were not there. We have been unable to detect in them even a coarse expression; and of the hateful narrowness and intolerance, the namby-pamby, the meaningless cant, the undue familiarity with holy things, which makes us turn with a shudder from so many modern collections of hymns, there is simply nothing.