ST CLEMENT’S APPLE FEAST,
STAFFORDSHIRE
Clemany! Clemany! Clemany mine!
A good red apple and a pint of wine,
Some of your mutton and some of your veal,
If it is good, pray give me a deal;
If it is not, pray give some salt.
Butler! butler! fill your bowl;
If thou fill’st it with the best,
The Lord’ll send your soul to rest;
If thou fill’st it of the small,
Down goes butler, bowl and all.
Pray, good mistress, send to me,
One for Peter, one for Paul,
One for Him who made us all,
Apple, pear, plum, or cherry,
Any good thing to make us merry;
A bouncing buck, and velvet chair,
Clement comes but once a year;
Off with the pot, and on with the pan,
A good red apple and I’ll begone!
SPRING
1600
Spring, the sweet spring, is the year’s pleasant king,
Then bloomes each thing, then maydes dance in a ring;
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing,
Cuckow, Jugge, Jugge, pu-we to witta woo.
The Palme and May make country houses gay,
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pype all day,
And we have aye birds tune this merry lay,
Cuckow, Jugge, Jugge, pu-we to witta woo.