Guest wrote: "The full name of the song is A Ditty Delightful Of Mother Watkins Ale, a warning well weighed though counted a tale, so it doesn't seem to be the young man that is Watkins."

I made no claim about Watkins. :-) I said WATKIN (no s). :-)

But there are two basic texts of Watkin's Ale. One is the one that begins "There was a maid this other day." The other begins "As Watkin walked by the way." That text seems largely forgotten (I have never seen a full version; it's reportedly from MS. Rawlinson Poet. 185), but clearly it had a character "Watkin" in it.

I don't think we know which text is older, but logic argues for "As Watkin walked by the way." Both texts were considered too dirty to print, so neither can be a bowdlerization of the other. But "There was a maid this other day" is so incredibly clever that I don't think anyone would replace it, except to bowdlerize it. Since it isn't bowdlerized, it is probably a replacement for the text "As Watkin walked...." That's not proof -- but it's typically how you expect things to happen.