The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #154349   Message #3622002
Posted By: Desert Dancer
24-Apr-14 - 01:26 PM
Thread Name: origin? RVW Danby hymn 'Tis Winter Now
Subject: The Brisk Young Farmer (Courted Me)
For completeness, here are the related links:

Ralph Vaughan Williams Manuscript Collection (at British Library) (RVW2/3/11)
First Line: A Brisk young farmer courted me
Performer: Bowes, Thomas
Date: 23 Jul 1904
Place: England : Yorkshire : Westerdale
Collector: Vaughan Williams, Ralph
Roud No: 60
http://www.vwml.org/record/RVW2/3/11
at The Full English ("The world's biggest free digital archive of English traditional folk music and dance tunes" via the RVW Memorial Library)

This brief note from Vaughan Williams gives the music notation for one verse and then says "verses as usual", and gives one "extra verse":

When 1st I wore my apron low
my love followed me thru frost & snow
but now my aprons up [to my?] chin
my love passes by and says nothing.

Here's the broadsheet for "A Brisk Young Farmer" at Broadside Ballads Online from the Bodleian Libraries:

Firth c.18(129)
Series Identifier: 157
Ballad
Title: The brisk young farmer
First Line: A brisk young farmer courted me

~ Becky in Long Beach