A wassail, a wassail, a wassail, we begin
With sugar-plum and cinamon, and other spices in ;
With a wassail, a wassail, a jolly wassail,
And may joy come to you, and to our wassail !

Good master and good mistress, as yon sit by the fire,
Consider us poor wassailers who travel through the mire,
With a wassail, &c.

Good master and good mistress, if you will be but willing,
Come send us out your eldest son with a sixpence or a shilling,
With, a wassail, &c.

Good master and good mistress, if thus it should you please,
Come send us out some white loaf, likewise your Christmas cheese
With a wassail, &c.

Good master and good mistress, if you will so incline,
Come send us out some roost beef, likewise your Christmas chine,
With a wassail, &c

If you've any maids within your bouse, as I suppose you've none,
They wouldn't let us stand a- wassailing so long on this cold stone,
With a wassail, &c.

For we've wassail'd all this day long, and nothing we could find,
Except an owl ¡11 an ivy bush, and ber we left behind, With a wassail, &c.

We'll cut a toast all round the loaf, and set it by the fire,
We'll wassail bees and apple trees, unto your heart's desire,
With a wassail, &c.

Our purses they are empty, our purses they are thin,
They lack a little silver to line them well within,
With a wassail, &c.

Hand out your silken kerchief upon your gold.-n spear,
We'll come no more a- wassailing until another year,
With a wassail, &c

EDWARD F. RIMBIÜLT.
A SUSSEX WASSAILING SONG.
I took it down some few years eince at Hurstpier-
point in Sussex, from the ringing of an old farmer •
who had learnt it in his youth. I have since heard fragments of it in different parts of Sussex, but the present version is the most complete I have yet obtained. I may add, that a copy of it is given in Old English Songs as now sung by the Peasantry of the Tt'cnld of Surrey and Sussex. This interesting work was privately printed in 1813 by the Rev. Mr. Broadwood, and is now very rare. The tune is a jovial one in the major kev, evidently of some antiquity. In Mr. Broad wood's collection the words are given to the old minor carol tune, " God rest ye, merry gentlemen " : —


\notes and queries
jan june 1872p5