"'flow sweet river'. "
Sweet Thanes Flow Softly" was written for a dramatised adaptation of 'Romeo and Juliet' set in the East End of London, for the then schools programmes - 'Down the Lane' was written for the same production
Neither were folk songs

Collins's story was supposed to have happened 65 years ago
I doubt if the audiences would have tolerated such an event, even then and, from the photographs at the time, he would have insulted most of the women on the scene at the time
Jim