The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #161176 Message #3829638
Posted By: Steve Gardham
30-Dec-16 - 02:52 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Died for Love: Sources and variants
Subject: RE: Origins: Died for Love: Sources and variants
Okay this is the Elizabeth St. Clair piece which may or may not have been redacted by her c1770 in Edinburgh. She was a member of Edinburgh high society and was a friend of Mrs. Cockburn. The ms also contains a few Child ballads some known to Child and some not.
The Irish Boy
O what a foolish girl was I
To fall in love with an Irish Boy
Who could not speak good English to me
Which was the thing that did undo me.
My mother chide me for my kindness
She often said I was led in blindness
But she may go home and frown in leisure
For a sight of my love is all my pleasure.
You go by my door as you do not know me
You seem to me as you did not love me
I loved you once and I durst not show it
Do you the same and let no man know it.
The rose it is red and the violet's blue
The honey's sweet love and so art thou
Thou art mine love and I am thine
I drew thee to be my Valentine.
O meeting's pleasure but parting's sorrow
Have the night and away tomorrow
But as you leave me so you'll find me
I cannot live one hour behind thee.
O if I were on yon high mountain
Had gold and money for the counting
I could not count it for thinking on thee
Have pity on me my dear honey.
Well did he know I could bake and brew
Well did he know I could shape and sew
Could wash his linnens and dress them fine
But now he's gone and left me behind.
My love's away and he's long of coming
My heart is broken with thinking on him
He's over seas and there he's carried
Another woman I fear he's married.
Home her father dear came then
Asking for his daughter Jean
Up stairs he ran and the door he broke
He found her hanging on a rope.
Two long hours after she was dead
These lines were found beneath her hand
This is the way I must end my life
Cause my lodger won't make me his wife.
Certainly a curious hotch-potch. Was she playing around with bits and pieces she knew and adding in her own ideas? I'll leave you for now to sort out where the bits and pieces come from. At least 7 of the 10 come from the general corpus of laments.