Hard sang the words of Charles Swan—
"'Twas on a Sunday morning, before the bells did peal,
A note came through the window, with Cupid as the seal."
These words were set to music by Francis Mori in 1853. I give Mori's tune, and advise that with it should be compared Hard's variation of it. I have written fresh words to this variation—
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[4.] The Trees they are so High. Words and melody taken down in 1888 first from James Parsons, then from Matthew Baker. Again in 1891 from Richard Broad, aged 71, of Herodsfoot, near S. Keyne, Cornwall. Again, the words, to a different air, from Roger Hannaford. Another version from William Aggett, a paralysed labourer of 70 years, at Chagford. Mr. Sharp has also obtained it in Somersetshire. A fragment was sung at the Folk-Song Competition at Frome in April 1904. Mr. Kidson has noted a version in Yorkshire, Miss Broadwood another in Surrey, see Folk-Song Journal, vol. i. p. 214. Apparently there exist two distinct variants of the ballad, each to its proper melody.
Johnson, in his "Museum," professed to give a Scottish version—
"O Lady Mary Ann looks owre the Castle wa',
She saw three bonny boys playing at the ba',
The youngest he was the flower among them a';
My bonny laddie's young, but he's growing yet."
But of his version only three of the stanzas are genuine, and they are inverted; the rest are a modern composition.
A more genuine Scottish form is in Maidment's "North Country Garland," Edinburgh, 1874; but there the young man is fictitiously converted into a Laird of Craigstoun. It begins—