John Arscott is still believed to hunt the country, and there are men alive who declare positively that they have seen him and his hounds go by, and have heard the winding of his horn, at night, in the park at Tetcott.
Mr. Frank Abbott, gamekeeper at Pencarrow, but born at Tetcott, informed me, concerning Dogget: "Once they unkennelled in the immediate neighbourhood of Tetcott, and killed at Hatherleigh. This runner was in at the death, as was his wont. John Arscott ordered him a bed at Hatherleigh, but to his astonishment, when he returned to Tetcott, his wife told him all the particulars of the run. 'Then,' said Arscott, 'this must be the doing of none other than Dogget; where is he?' Dogget was soon found in the servants' hall, drinking ale, having outstripped his master and run all the way home."
In the MS. copy of 1820, the names of the "Sons of the Blue" were Bob (Robt. Dennis of S. Breock), Bill (Bill Tickell), and Britannia (Sir J. Molesworth). The tune, which is in the Æolian mode, was obtained through the assistance of Mr. W.C. Richards, schoolmaster at Tetcott. We also had it from John Benney, labourer, Menheniot.
Mr. Richards writes:—"This song is sung annually at the Rent-audit of the Molesworth estate at Tetcott. Thirty years ago an old man sang it, and the version I send you is as near the original, as sung by him, as can be secured. Workmen on the estate often hum the air, and always sing it at their annual treats." The Arscott property at Tetcott passed by inheritance to the Molesworths.
Half of the tune was employed by D'Urfey, a Devonshire man, in his "Pills to Purge Melancholy," to the words, "Dear Catholic Brother" (vi. p. 277, ed. 1719-20). From D'Urfey it passed into the "Musical Miscellany," 1731, vi. p. 171, to the words, "Come take up your Burden, ye Dogs, and away." From England the same half-tune was carried into Wales, and Jones, in his "Musical Relicks of the Welsh Bards," 1794, i. p. 129, gives it set to the words of "Difarwch gwyn Dyfl."
As Benny's variant is interesting, I give it here—
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[3.] Upon a Sunday Morning. The melody taken down from Robert Hard, South Brent. This is the song to which reference has been made in the Introduction. It is not a genuine folk melody, but it is an interesting example of the way in which the folk muse reshapes an air.