[98.] Barley Straw. Taken down from the singing of Mr. G.H. Hurell, the blind organist at Chagford, as he heard it sung by a carpenter, William Beare, in 1875. The words were very coarse, consequently Mr. Sheppard re-wrote the song. The air was used by A.S. Rich, without its most characteristic passages, for Hunneman's comic "Old King Cole," pub. circ. 1830. Much the same tune is in Akerman's "Wiltshire Tales," 1853, as a Wiltshire Harvest Home, p. 132. Harmonised in the Æolian mode, though the seventh of the scale is absent.
[99.] Death and the Lady. This was first sent to me by Captain Hall Munro, of Ingesdon House, Newton Abbot, as sung by an old man there. Subsequently we obtained the same from Roger Hannaford. This is quite different from the "Dialogue of Death and the Lady," found in black letter Broadsides, and given by Bell in his "Songs of the English Peasantry," p. 32. The tune to this latter is given by Chappell, i. p. 167. In Carey's "Musical Century," 1738, is given the air of "Death and the Lady" as "an old tune." But this melody and ours have nothing in common.
What is the signification of "branchey tree" in connection with Death, I am at a loss to say. "Death and the Lady" was one of the ballads sung by Farmer Williams in "The Vicar of Wakefield."
[100.] Both Sexes Give Ear to My Fancy. This old song is a favourite with the peasantry throughout England. The words are printed in Bell's "Songs of the English Peasantry," p. 231. He says, "We have had considerable trouble in procuring a copy of the old song, which used, in former days, to be very popular with aged people resident in the North of England. It has been long out of print, and handed down traditionally. By the kindness of Mr. S. Swindells, printer, Manchester, we have been favoured with an ancient printed copy." In the original the song consists of ten verses. The earliest copy of it that I know is in "The Lady's Evening Book of Pleasure," about 1740. It will be found in a collection of garlands made by Mr. J. Bell about 1812, and called by him "The Eleemosynary Emporium." It is in the British Museum. The air is found in "Vocal Music, or the Songster's Companion," 2nd ed., 1772, to the song, "Farewell, Ye Green Fields and Sweet Groves," p. 92. It was taken into "The Tragedy of Tragedies, or Tom Thumb," 1734, as the air to "In Hurry, Posthaste for a Licence," and was attributed to Dr. Arne. In "Die Familie Mendelssohn," vol. ii., is a scrap of music written down by Felix Mendelssohn, dated Leipzig, 16th August 1840, which is identical with the first few bars of this melody. But the earliest form of the air is in J.S. Bach's "Comic Cantata," where a peasant sings it.
We took the song down from John Rickards, Lamerton, and again from J. Benney, Menheniot. Mr. Kidson prints a Yorkshire version in his "Traditional Tunes," 1891. Miss L. Broadwood has noted it down from the singing of a baker at Cuckfield, Sussex. Dr. Barrett gives our melody to "The Gallant Hussar," No. 13. We have also taken it down to this ballad; so has Mr. Sharp in Somerset.
[101.] I Rode My Little Horse. Words and music from Edmund Fry, Lydford, and again from John Bennett, a labourer at Chagford, and from John Hunt, a shepherd, Postbridge.
Compare with this the ballad in d'Urfey's "Pills to Purge Melancholy," named "Jolly Roger Twangdillo," 1719, i. p. 19. A Broadside copy of the ballad exists, printed by Jennings, of Waterlane, London, circ. 1790.
The same theme is used in a ballad in the Pepysian Collection. See Ebsworth, "Roxburgh Ballads," vii. 231. Each verse ends—
"I vow I will marry, but I know not when."