Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 29 Dec 11 - 04:41 PM

I've spent the day reading this study by Clinton Heylin on Bob Dylan's "House Carpenter."

http://www.clinton-heylin.com/PDFs/DaemonBitz.pdf

Brian Peters referred to it above in this thread, and we also posted this link above. I want to recommend this piece for anybody who is seriously interested in this ballad. In attempting to answer the question: "Where did Bob get this?" Heylin launches into a major study of the history of this ballad. He examines the manuscript history and interaction, the interaction of oral tradition and the broadsides, and the relation of "The House Carpenter" to other ballads in the "Child Collection." Apparently Bob Dylan's version, which he recorded for his first Columbia album, but which was not on that album, is a rather unique version both in terms of what is usually found in North America and in terms of what was being sung during the "revival" at that time by folks like Baez, Clayton, Van Ronk and others.

Here is a sample of some of what Heylin is concerned about:

"That the De Marsan strain of 'House Carpenter' seems to have overwritten many a text that previously drew solace from British oral tradition is truly a damning indictment of what might be termed The Broadside Effect upon traditional processes. Even when there remains evidence of a British oral source underlying an American rendition, the De Marsan gloss has almost always been applied. This makes particularly problematic establishing the form and relative dispersal of texts prevalent in the US at the time of the De Marsan printing."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 30 Dec 11 - 06:21 PM

The Heylin material brought to my attention a version of "The House Carpenter" in the Flanders collection that I had overlooked. It was collected July 13, 1932 from Mrs. Ellen M. Sullivan of Springfield, Vermont, and was entitled "The Banks of Claudy." It is significantly different from all of the other versions collected by Flanders. Mrs. Sullivan gave two different accounts of her ballad. They are as follows, taken directly from ANCIENT BALLADS, by Helen Hartness Flanders. I think that the phrases in parentheses were spoken by Mrs Sullivan, and the phrases in brackets is commentary by Flanders.

The Banks of Claudy

'Twas on the banks of Claudy

(Girl promises to marry a man who goes away, dies and as a ghost returns and says)

"Oh, come with me to the banks fo Claudy,
And perform those promises to me."

(Later in the song:)

When she came to the banks of Claudy,
Oh, sorry sore was she,
There was seven ships sailing to the brim.
They sunk to the bottom and was never seen no more.

When she came to the banks of Claudy,
Oh, sorry sore was she, she,
For the ships they were made of the yellow beaten gold
And the sails were of silk so fine.

[Mrs. Sullivan remembered August 23, 1932, more of "On the Banks fo Cludy," which she called "George Allis."]

(She lay asleep and his ghost came to her.)

"Oh, begone, begone, young George Allis,
For I am a married wife,
Oh, begone, young George," she said,
"For fear there may be strife."

"That is not the promise you gave to me
To come in seven long years and a ay,
So now come on to the salty seas
And perform your promises to me."

[Another time later, Mrs. Sullivan "broke out" with:]

"Oh, begone, begone, young George Allis,
For I am a married wife;
Oh, begone, young George," she said,
"For fear there may be strife, strife,
For fear there may be strife."

"Oh, that is not the promise you made to me
To come again in seven long years and a day
So now come on to the salty sea
And perform your promise to me, to me,
And perform your promise to me."

(She got up and dressed herself.)

When she came to the banks of Claudy
Oh, sorry, sore was she, she,
For there was seen ships floating to the brim
Which was never seen no more, more,
Which was never seen no more.

Then they sailed away for seven leagues;
then they sailed away for seven leagues.
She sank to the bottom of the sea, sea;
She sank to the bottom of the sea
And never was seen again.

[Mrs. Sullivan commented: "He was dead and came back as a ghost after seven years because of the oath that was between them."
---
Second Version

[As sung by Mrs. Ellen M. Sullivan of Springfield, Vermont. Mrs. Sullivan says this tells of a man who was dead who came back as a ghost after seven years, because of the oath that was between him and the girl.]

"O begone, begone, young George Allis,"
For I am a married wife;
O, begone, young George, " she said,
"For fear there may be strife."

"that is not the promise you made to me
To come in seven long years and a day,
So now come on to the salty sea
And perform your promises to me."

When she came to the salty seas,
O sorry sore was she,
There were seven ships floating (sailing) to the brim,
they were sunk to the bottom and was never seen again.

When she came t the banks of Claudy
O sorry sore as she,
Fr the ships they were made of the yellow beaten gold
And the sails of the silk so fine.

Then they sailed away for seven leagues

She sank to the bottom of the sea, sea,
And never was seen again.

[Another time Mrs. Sullivan changed the verses slightly:}

"O, that is not the promise you gave to me
To be gone for a year and a day,
To come again in seven long years and a day;
So now come on to the salty sea
And perform your promises to me, to me."

When she came to the banks of Claudy
For the ship was made of the yellow beaten gold
And the sails were of silk so fine, fine,
And the sails were of silk so fine,

(He was dead and came back as a ghost. She was asleep; she dreamt he came back. She begged to go back to her husband and baby.)

And she sank to the bottom of the sea, sea,
And she sank to the bottom of the sea
And was never seen again,
There was seven ships a-floated to the brim.
They sank to the bottom and were never seen no more.

Heylin says:

"The importance of the "former vows" to the original tale of 'The Dæmon Lover' cannot be underestimated. ...
Though these "former vows" are rarely encountered in American tradition, another Stateside text, collected in Eastern Tennessee by Charles Morrow Wilson, reveals the subtext of these vows that irked the dæmon lover so:

Well met, well met, my own true love,
Well met, well met, said he.
Now that the span of years is done
I'm returnin' to marry thee.

Have you wedded any other man?
I'm shore I've wed no other woman.
Yes, I'm wedded to a house carpenter,
And I think he's a very nice man.

You better leave your house carpenter
And come along with me;
We'll go till we come to the old salt sea,
And married we will be.2

So these vows were almost certainly secret vows of marriage, exchanged by two lovers before the male partner took to sea....

Just one other American version preserves these "former vows." ...the rendition in question, uncovered in Springfield, Vermont, not only survived uncontaminated by De Marsan and his various proxys but by any derivative from Diverting Songs. The female repository, one Ellen M. Sullivan, first recollected the song to collector Helen Hartness Flanders on July 13, 1932. All that she remembered was that a, "girl promises to marry a man who goes away, dies and as a ghost returns and says,"

Oh come with me to the banks of Claudy,
And perform those promises to me, me.
...
Mrs. Sullivan also commented to Flanders that, "He was dead and came back as a ghost after seven years because of the oath that was between them,"9 making explicit the revenant nature of the dæmon lover and recognizing the 'broken vows' as the song's key motif. This sort of explication is not repeated in American tradition until Mr. Dylan's highly unusual rendition, which also 'reveals' the revenant nature of the 'man' at the outset (though not the "former vows")....

Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of the Sullivan text, though, is that she has a name for the revenant, George Allis, seemingly a simple phonetic corruption of the only name ever assigned to the mysterious ex-lover, James Harris (or as Peter Buchan would have it, James Herries). Though it was under this title that the song came to be assigned in Child's English & Scottish Popular Ballads, only Buchan called the song by this name."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 30 Dec 11 - 06:25 PM

Here is Bob Dylan's version, from Heylin:

[spoken:] Here's a story about a ghost come back from out in the sea, come to take his bride away from the house carpenter.

1. Well met, well met, my own true love,
Well met, well met, cried he,
I've just returned from the salt, salt sea,
And it's all for the love of thee.

2. I could have married a king's daughter there,
She would have married me,
But I have forsaken my king's daughter there,
And it's all for the love of thee.

3. Well, if you could have married a king's daughter there,
'm sure you're the one to blame,
For I am married to a house carpenter,
And I'm sure he's a fine young man.

4. Forsake, forsake your house carpenter,
And come away with me,
I'll take you to where the green grass grows,
On the shores of sunny Italy.

5. So up she picked her babies three,
And gave them kisses one-two-three, saying,
Take good care of your Daddy when I'm gone,
And keep him good company.

6. Well, they were sailing about two weeks,
I'm sure it was not three,
When the younger of the girls [sic], she came on deck,
Saying [she] wants company.

7. Well, are you weeping for your house and home,
Or are you weeping for your fee?
Well, I'm not weeping for my house carpenter,
I'm weeping for my babies three.

8. Oh what are those hills yonder, my love,
They look as white as snow,
Those are the hills of heaven, my love,
Where you and I'll never know.

9. What are those hills yonder, my love,
They look as black as night,
Those are the hills of hellfire, my love,
Where you and I will unite.

10. Oh, twice around went the gallant ship,
I'm sure it was not three,
When the ship all of a sudden sprung a leak
And drifted to the bottom of the sea.2

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 06:45 PM

In his study of the origins of Bob Dylan's version of "The House Carpenter," Clinton Heylin notices a number of verses that show up in various renditions of this ballad in the U.S. that are not found in the De Marsan/J. Andrews broadside of the mid-1800s. He comments on this broadside saying,

"The so-called De Marsan broadside, actually first published by De Marsan's predecessor J. Andrews in New York circa 1857 - and rapidly adopted by American printers of songsters and broadsides like Delaney and Wehamn - seems to have played a large part in any mini-revival, at the same time loosening the grip of all previous templates on American tradition. Of the 200+ versions collected in America in the twentieth century, not even a handful omit this text's unmistakeable watermark.

In other words, this nineteenth century American broadside, a descendant of a late seventeenth-century English broadside, has been almost entirely responsible for the song's survival, and the form of its survival, in twentieth century tradition."

But what about those verses that keep showing up in the American versions that are not in the De Marsan broadside? Through a detailed analysis, Heylin traces these verses back to either Scottish versions of the ballad, or to other Scottish ballads. On this basis he is able to hypothesize that there were earlier, or at least other sources for the spreading popularity of "The House Carpenter" in America, and to further posit that these sources were more than likely Scottish.

Here are those verses that are not a part of the De Marsan broadside, but which show up in various American versions of the ballad, which Heylin has been able to trace back to Scottish origins.

If you will leave your house carpenter,
And go along with me.
I'll take you where the grass grows green,
On the banks of sweet Italy.                               [the use of "sweet Italy"]

O hold your tongue of your former vows,
For they'll bring bitter strifes.
O hold your tongue of your former vows,
For I have become a wife.
--
She dressed herself in rich attire,
Most glorious to behold,
And as she tread upon her road
She shone like the glittering gold.
---
Oh, what is that [hill] that shines so white,
That shines as white as snow?
Oh, those are the hills of heaven itself,
Where we may never go.

Oh, what is that [hill] that shines so black,
That shines as black as a crow?
Oh, that is the [hills] of Hell itself,
Where you and I must go.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 10:49 PM

Banks of Claudy as a version of the House Carpenter? I don't know if I buy that. Is that Helen Flanders's interpretation?

However, a quick Google search for "house carpenter + banks of claudy" to see if anyone else had anything to say about them brought up a this:

"Never without a song: the years and songs of Jennie Devlin, 1865-1952" by Katharine D. Newman (1995, University of Illinois Press, foward by Alan Lomax). Jennie Devlin, has a version of the House Carpenter (and also a version of the Banks of Claudy).

Though this book was published in 1995, the process of its creation started with recordings made by Lomax and the author in 1936-1938. Jennie Devlin was born in 1865 in upstate New York, rejected by her mother, and by age 5 was "bound out" as an indentured servant working for her keep; at age 14 she began working for wages. She spent several years with a family of itinerant basketmakers and fiddlers who traveled throughout the northeastern states and into southern Canada, where she started building her repertoire of songs. (see review by Gloria Eive in MELUS Vol. 21, No. 1, Spring, 1996) She later lived in Philadelphia and Gloucester, New Jersey.

Library of Congress catalog record for the recordings (the recordings are not available online, unfortunately)

If you scroll up at the first link (to Google Books), you'll see the tune, as well (although the transcriptions for this collection are strongly criticized by Gloria Eive), and quite a bit of the book is available.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 11:04 PM

And, I should have noted: Jennie Devlin's version is a fragment, and with the singer insisting that the woman returned to her child.

"Well met, well met, O my own true love,
Well met, well met, O," cries she.
"I've come across the deep blue sea,
And it's all for o'er the love of thee."

"If I am to give up my house carpenter,
And also my little baby,
What have you got to support me upon,
On the banks of the old Tennessee?"

"I have six ships a-sailing the sea,
And one hundred and ten
Of your own countrymen
For to be at your command."

[So she goes with him] -- states the singer

She picks up her dear little baby,
And kisses it one, two, and three,
Saying "Stay at home with your daddy,
While I go sailing on the sea."

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 12:43 AM

I see that the Ballad Index entry says

"Flanders-Ancient3, pp. 287-321, "James Harris, or the Daemon Lover" (13 texts plus 3 fragments, some mixed with other songs (e.g. "G" has the "Turtle Dove" verse; "N" is very confused, with references to the Banks of Claudy), 11 tunes) {A=Bronson's #93, N=#141}"

and that this has been picked up in Roud (as listed by Mick Pearce above, but does anyone else conflate Banks of Claudy with Demon Lover?

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 10:22 AM

Becky, thanks for the Jennie Devlon fragment of the "House Carpenter"/"Banks of Claudy" fragment. When I first glanced at the fragment that Flanders collected from Mrs. Sullivan, I skipped over it and didn't see it as being of much relevance. But reading Heylin's study changed my mind on this. He devotes a bit of discussion to Mrs. Sullivan's version and sees it as a significant example of the survival of an independent Scottish tradition of "The Daemon Lover" in North America. His discussion of this is too complicated to present here, but please do take a look at his (long) article here:

http://www.clinton-heylin.com/PDFs/DaemonBitz.pdf

Scroll down about a fourth of the way to section (iii) "All For The Sake of Thee". Heylin discusses a Virginia text from Miss Tyrah Lam of Elkton, VA (1935) in the Wilkinson Collection at UVA (actually he has discussed this text in detail in the previous section along with the fine version from Kentucky by Clay Walters). And then he mentions an East Tennessee text from Charles Morrow Wilson. His question in all of this is the role of "the vows", which in fact are "broken vows". This theme does not show up in the De Marsan broadside tradition, but they are in the older Scottish traditions. And it is in this context that Heylin finds the Sullivan text of the "Banks of Claudy" important, since the Sullivan text begins with:

Oh come with me to the banks of Claudy,
And perform those promises to me, me.

And:

That is not the promise you gave to me
To come in seven long years and a day,
So now come on to the salty seas
And perform your promises to me.

Heylin says:

"Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of the Sullivan text, though, is that she has a name for the revenant, George Allis, seemingly a simple phonetic corruption of the only name ever assigned to the mysterious ex-lover, James Harris (or as Peter Buchan would have it, James Herries). Though it was under this title that the song came to be assigned in Child's English & Scottish Popular Ballads, only Buchan called the song by this name."

Oh, begone, begone, young George Allis,
For I am a married wife,
Oh, begone, young George, she said,
For fear there may be strife.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 10:44 AM

"does anyone else conflate Banks of Claudy with Demon Lover"

Much further up this thread I listed a whole set of variants for the 'Banks of Italy' line, many of them apparently nonsensical. It seems to me as though a particular singer, seeking some appropriate banks for the destination of the journey, settled on 'Claudy' on the basis of a memory of a different song. Apart from the name there doesn't seem to be any substance of either of the two 'Banks of Claudy' songs that I know with thatversion of 'House Carpenter'.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 12:00 PM

Maybe it would be best to go ahead and put up what Heylin says about the Sullivan text. It's a long quote:

"Just one other American version preserves these "former vows." Unlike Wilkinson's and Wilson's collected texts, the rendition in question, uncovered in Springfield, Vermont, not only survived uncontaminated by De Marsan and his various proxys but by any derivative from Diverting Songs. The female repository, one Ellen M. Sullivan, first recollected the song to collector Helen Hartness Flanders on July 13, 1932. All that she remembered was that a, "girl promises to marry a man who goes away, dies and as a ghost returns and says,"

Oh come with me to the banks of Claudy,
And perform those promises to me, me.

later in the song:

When she came to the banks of Claudy,
Oh, sorry sore was she.
There were seven ships sailing to the brim.
They sunk to the bottom and was never seen no more.

When she came to the banks of Claudy,
Oh, sorry sore was she, she,
For the ships they were made of the yellow beaten gold
And the sails were of silk so fine.4

A month later Flanders returned and managed to glean some additional verses. Mrs. Sullivan called the song 'George Allis', and recalled that the girl in the song, "lay asleep and his ghost came to her." She then recalled much the same verse as Miss Lam:

Oh, begone, begone, young George Allis,
For I am a married wife,
Oh, begone, young George, she said,
For fear there may be strife.

as well as a verse not replicated in any other traditional text, though the second couplet approximates to Morrow Wilson's third verse:

That is not the promise you gave to me
To come in seven long years and a day,
So now come on to the salty seas
And perform your promises to me.5

At last we encounter the evidence that Dylan's "ghost come back from out in the sea" once existed in American tradition. Indeed, in Sullivan's text the ghost came to her in her sleep, placing it in the long-established tradition of revenant ("one who returns after a long absence, esp. the dead"6) ballads. The hugely popular "Well met, well met" opening, though, does not fit easily with such a night visitation.

As an intriguing addendum, the version that Mrs. Sullivan sang to Flanders carried a burden, the final line of each verse repeating the final word and then the entire line, thus:

For fear there may be strife, strife,
For fear there may be strife.7

This rare verse-ending also appears in the version collected by Wilkinson from Miss Lam, this time as a three-word repeat, thus:

And I think he's a nice young man, man, man,
And I think he's a nice young man.8

perhaps suggesting a connection somewhere down the stream of tradition. Mrs. Sullivan also commented to Flanders that, "He was dead and came back as a ghost after seven years because of the oath that was between them,"9 making explicit the revenant nature of the dæmon lover and recognizing the 'broken vows' as the song's key motif. This sort of explication is not repeated in American tradition until Mr. Dylan's highly unusual rendition, which also 'reveals' the revenant nature of the 'man' at the outset (though not the "former vows").

Comparison with A Collection Of Diverting Songs makes it plain that the 'blame' for a form of rationalization that turned the former lover from revenant to flesh and blood should not be placed at any Yankee's door. It had already occured within the (perhaps exclusively) English strain from which the American broadside largely came. In this rationalized 'English' derivative, the lady does not leave her husband and children without some considerable persuasion on her lover's part; and does so only because of the obligation (and, perhaps, love) she still felt for her former dear. As we shall see, in Scottish oral tradition (and the two American texts that best reflect that tradition) the lady is taken to her death not because she elected to take her lover's proferred escape route - "dying from guilt far from her children,"10 as Alan Lomax chose to put it - but because she had proved untrue to her former love, having broken the solemn vows she swore some (seven) years before.

The broken vows may be implicit in some twentieth century texts - "I have returned from the salt, salt sea/ And all for the sake of thee" does imply at least some debt of honour ("the love of thee" makes for an inferior reading) - but more traditional texts, of which the renditions collected by Wilkinson, Wilson and Flanders are rare vestiges, make the vow not only explicit, but the veritable crux of our tale.

Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of the Sullivan text, though, is that she has a name for the revenant, George Allis, seemingly a simple phonetic corruption of the only name ever assigned to the mysterious ex-lover, James Harris (or as Peter Buchan would have it, James Herries). Though it was under this title that the song came to be assigned in Child's English & Scottish Popular Ballads, only Buchan called the song by this name."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 02:39 PM

I may have confused the issue; to clarify, the Jennie Devlin book contains both the House Carpenter and Banks of Claudy, but they're given as entirely separate songs. The verses I transcribed are what she had as the House Carpenter.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 04:37 PM

My apologies to you, Becky. I didn't look close enough at what I was doing or you were saying, and it was me who confused the issue on the Devlin fragment. Can you post the Devlin version of "Banks of Claudy" for comparative purposes?

And Brian, reading back upstream a ways, I came across this note from you in response to my posting of the Robert Shifflett version from Virginia, in which you list a number of the verses and phrases that differ from the De Marsan broadside and point out that they have parallels in the earlier Scottish versions, which is very similar to what Heylin is suggesting. Here is your previous note:

thread.cfm?threadid=141964&messages=111#3274135

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 04 Jan 12 - 10:37 AM

Unfortunately, I seem to have gotten lucky with Google Books on the House Carpenter, but Banks of Claudy is not available, since it's a preview of the book, not a full e-book.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 04 Jan 12 - 12:41 PM

Thanks, Becky. Google Books is a mixed blessing and at times frustrating! Maybe someone else has access to this and can put it up.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 11 Jan 12 - 03:27 PM

Part I

I want to offer some analysis of the versions of the "House Carpenter" collected in the Northeastern part of the United States that we have found so far. At this time I am not including the Canadian versions. I am also excluding the version known as "The Banks of Claudy", collected from Ellen Sullivan of Springfield, Vermont, since it is so different from all of the others, and I have already posted Heylin's analysis of it. And, I am excluding, for now, the version collected from Edith Ballenger Price, of Newport, Rhode Island, entitled "The Daemon Lover." This, too, is a unique version, different from all of the others. I will discuss it in a different context later.

In addition to the Sullivan and Price variants, there are two other versions that are significantly different enough from the rest to deserve mention. One is the version entitled "The Young Turtle Dove", from a manuscript that belonged to Mrs. John Luther of Pittsburg, New Hampshire. The other is the version from Alec Couchey of Essex, New York, as sung by Lee Knight, entitled "The Gypsy Daisy", which combines "The House Carpenter" with "The Gypsy Davey." I will be including both of these variants in my discussion.

There are also a number of fragments or incomplete versions in what we have found so far. They are as follows: the version from Susie Carr Young, of Brewer, Maine; the one from Celia Kelter, of Tabasco, New York; the one from Mrs. Wales of Burlington, Vermont; the one from Maynard Reynolds of Pittsburgh, New Hampshire; the one from Clarence Cutting from the Adirondack region of New York, and the one from Jennie Devlin, from either Gloucester, Massachusetts or perhaps New Jersey. I will include all of these fragments in my discussion.

I will also include the broadside printed by De Marsan, which I assume is the same one printed by "J. Andrews" in New York City in 1857. We don't know the sources for the Andrews/De Marsan broadside, but since it was printed in New York, it seems to me to be a part of our collection, as well as one of the possible sources for the others that we have found.

All of our versions have been collected roughly within a hundred years of the printing of the Andrews/De Marsan broadside. It predates all of our versions and certainly could have been around for all of our singers to draw on as a source. I want to try to see which of our versions seem most dependent upon the broadside and which ones differ from it the most. All of them follow the same general narrative of the broadside, but with some significant individual variations. None of our versions correspond exactly with the broadside. Each one differs in some significant way.

I have not been able to see any geographical tendencies among our versions. The "state boundaries" seem irrelevant, so I have decided to ignore them. Also the distance from New York City as the source of the broadside does not seem relevant. We don't have enough samples from Canada to be able to tell about any influence from that direction. So I am treating our versions strictly on a regional basis within the northeastern part of the United States.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 11 Jan 12 - 06:20 PM

Part II

There are a number of themes that do not show up in the versions of "The House Carpenter" that we have "collected" on this thread. These are themes that are common to the older versions from the British Isles. This includes the "Andrews/De Marsan" broadside, and excludes the Sullivan and Price versions.

There is no mention of any "ghost" or of "the Devil". As far as I can tell there are no hints at anything supernatural or diabolical. There is no mention of any "broken vows" or any punishment for the woman because she has broken previous vows. The person who steals away the House Carpenter's wife has "come from the sea," "come across the sal', salt sea," has "crossed the sea," has "crossed the salt sea wave," has "come across the sea," has "returned from the salt, salt sea," has "come across the deep blue sea," has "just returned from the salt, salt sea" (Willard). George Edward's version says,

"It's pretty well met to my own true love,
It's pretty well met," says he,
"It's pretty well met to my own true love,
Long time I've waited for thee, O thee,
A long time I've waited for thee.

This seems to indicate that the one absent (at sea) has "waited" a "long time". This is the only mention of time in any of the versions. There is no mention of "seven years" in any of them.

There is no mention of anybody's actual name in any of these versions. And finally, none of these Northeastern versions, including the broadsides, have the two verses about seeing the hills of "heaven" and "hell", which are so frequent in the Southern versions. There is no mention of the ship being destroyed by it's owner at sea. In every case it sinks because of natural causes.

There is no use of older English words, such as "league", or any signs of Scottish dialect in any of these versions. George Edwards does make reference to "pounds" in a verse that is unique to him and seems to have come from some other song:

"But if I was worth ten thousand pounds,
So freely I'd give it to thee
If I could once more go on yonder shore
My two [three] little babes to see, O see,
My two [three] little babes to see."

Edwards' version is somewhat anachronistic throughout. Two of the versions, from Mancour (VT) and Degreenia (CT), mention "the sweet Dundee." But it is impossible to know why and whether this reference came with the ballad or from other associations, since the names associated with this particular verse are very diverse. None of the versions refer to "the banks of sweet Italy." And none of them refer to "white lilies at the bottom of the sea."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 12 Jan 12 - 03:46 PM

Part III

We are looking at 15 more or less complete versions, plus 6 fragments of "The House Carpenter" from the Northeastern region of the U.S. One of these is the "Andrews/De Marsan" broadside, printed in New York/Philadelphia in 1857/1860. I want to turn my attention now to trying to see what influence this broadside might have had on the ballad in this region. As I mentioned before, there are no exact reproductions of the broadside.

I want to begin by noting a couple of differences from the broadside version that are found widespread throughout the Northeast. In the third verse, the broadside has the line

"I will take you where the grass grows high,"

Out of the 21 versions represented, 14 of them have

"the grass grows GREEN" (or "greener" in the Cutting version)

These are Cornwright NY, Couchey NY, Willard NY, Cutting NY, Johnson ME, Reynolds ME/NH, Moses NH, Luther NH, Richards NH, Fish NH, Merrill NH, George VT, Mancour VT, and Degreenia CT. As can be seen, they are spread all over the region.

A second difference of wording comes at the end of the fourth verse. The broadside has

"And keep my from misery."

Out of the 21 versions represented, 11 have "SLAVERY" instead of "misery." They are Cornwright, Kelter, Couchey, Willard, Cuttng and Edwards of NY, Moses, Richards, Fish, and Merrill of NH, and George of VT.

The fact that these two wording differences are so widespread and so consistent suggests an alternative source, especially with regard to "misery"/"slavery", which are not really synonyms. It is curious why "slavery" would be preferred, and perhaps an interesting commentary on the situation of women in that culture (?). Grass growing "green" seems a more natural image than grass growing "high", perhaps suggesting that "green" was at least the more popular version, if not the more "original" or earlier version.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 12 Jan 12 - 04:46 PM

Part IV

In addition to a preference for "green" grass and "slavery", there are a number of other differences from the Andrews/De Marsan broadside that show up in these Northeastern versions. One of these is the repetition of the last line or two of a verse used as a refrain. This shows up in seven of the twenty-one versions: Edwards NY, Cornwright NY, Johnson ME, Reynolds ME/NH, Luther NH, George VT, Mancour VT.

Another difference is the addition of the verse that refers to the lady dressing up and parading her riches. An example is from Sarah Willard's version from 1869 in NY:

She dressed herself in rich array
And riches to behold
And every street that she passed through
She showed her glittering gold.

Sometimes she dresses in "scarlet red " (twice from NH, Moses and Richards).

In one version, the "House Carpenter" becomes the "Ship's Carpenter" (Fish NH), and in another version, both "House Carpenter" and "Ship's Carpenter" are mentioned (Edwards NY)

In four of the versions (Cornwright NY, Johnson ME, Fish NH, and George VT), the first two verses of the broadside are conflated into one verse. The broadside has:

"Well met, well met, my own true love,
Well met, well met," cried he
"For I've just returned from the Salt Sea,
All for the love of thee."

"I might have married the King's daughter, dear,"
"You might have married her," cried she,
"For I am married to a House Carpenter,
And a fine young man is he."

These four versions have something equivalent to Mrs. Cornwright's version:

"Well met, well met, my pretty fair maid."
"Not so very well met," said she,
"For I am married to a house-carpenter,
And he is good to me."

In four of the versions, there is a preference for "pretty fair maid" instead of "my own true love" (Johnson ME, Fish NH, George VT, Mancour VT). Both phrases seem to be something like stock ballad phrases, but are different in meaning, perhaps reflecting two different sources.

Two of the versions begin with the verse "I might have married the king's daughter fair," And in five of the versions, there is the addition of a reproach in response to this bragging about having turned down an offer of marriage to a "King's daughter":

"If you could have married a king's daughter fair,
I'm sure you are much to blame,

This is found in Moses NH, Luther NH, Richards NH, Merrill NH, and Mancour VT.

Instead of "What have you got to keep me upon" in the fourth verse of the broadside, three of the versions have "What have you there to ENTERTAIN me on/with" (Johnson ME, Fish NH, George VT).

Two versions have reference to "three ships loaded down with gold" (Moses NH, Degreeenia CT).

Only one of the twenty versions other than the broadside has the phrase "On the banks of the old Tennessee." Curiously enough this is the fragment from Jennie Devlin.

Four of the versions have "sweet Willie" (Willard NY, Reynolds ME/NH, Luther NH, Merrill NH) and five of them have "sweet valley" (Cornwright NY, Johnson ME, Richards NH, Fish NH, George VT). The repetition of these similarities suggests other sources or influences than the broadside.

In five of the versions, the lady says that indeed she is mourning for her house carpenter and her baby (Cornwright NY, Johanson ME, Fish NH, George VT, Wales VT). The broadside says that she is only weeping for her "sweet little babe."

While the broadside says that the ship went down when it "struck a rock and sprung a leak." Six of the versions have some variation on "When a hole in the ship it sprang a leak," (Johnson ME, Cornwright NY, Fish NH, George VT, Mancour VT, Wales VT).

Thirteen of the versions, including the fragments, omit any reference to a curse at the end of the ballad.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 09:23 AM

Part V

Which of our versions from the Northeast come closest to matching the "Andrews/De Marsan" broadside? I have already mentioned the Devlin version, which is the only one to contain the phrase "on the banks of the old Tennessee."   It is a fragment, with only four verses, and one could say that all four verses match up with the broadside. The "Salt Sea" has become "the deep blue sea." I would appreciate clarification on the geographical context for the Devlin version. I have not been able to resolve that issue.

Aside from Jennie Devlin's song, I think that there are only two other versions that come very close to the broadside. One is the Sarah Willard manuscript from Moriah Center NY, written in 1869. The other is the version published by Flanders from Oscar Degreenia of West Cornwall CT.

I am going to go through the Willard and Degreenia versions and compare them verse by verse with the Andrews/De Marsan broadside. The broadside comes first, and then Willard as our oldest written manuscript, and then Degreenia. I have put some of the word differences in CAPITALS.

"Well met, well met, my own true love,
Well met, well met," cried he
"For I've just returned from the Salt Sea,
All for the love of thee."

Well met, well met my own true love
Well met, well met, said he
I have just returned from the salt, salt sea
All for the love of thee

"I have came across the sea, salt sea;
It was all for the sake of thee.
---

"I might have married the King's daughter, dear,"
"You might have married her," cried she,
"For I am married to a House Carpenter,
And a fine young man is he."

Willard omits this verse.

"I might have married a king's daughter FAIR
And she would married me."
"For I have married a house carpenter
And I think he's a very nice man."
---

"If you will forsake your House Carpenter,
And go along with me,
I will take you where the grass grows high,
On the banks of old Tennessee."

If you will forsake your house carpenter
And go along with me
I will take you where the grass grows GREEN
On the Banks of the SWEET WILLIE?

"If you will LEAVE your house carpenter
And COME along with me,
I'll take you there where the grass grows GREEN
On the banks of the SWEET DUNDEE."
---

"If I forsake my House Carpenter,
And go along with thee,
What have you got to keep me upon,
And keep me from misery."

If I'll forsake my house carpenter
And go along with thee
Have you anything to MAINTAIN me upon
And to keep me from SLAVERY.

"If I should leave my house carpenter
And go along with thee,
What have you there to SUPPORT me on
Or keep me from misery?"
---

Says he, "I've got six ships at sea,
All sailing to dry land,
One hundred and ten of your own countrymen,
Love, they shall be at your command."

One hundred ships I have at sea
A-making for dry land
With two hundred and ten bold jolly seamen
All shall be at your command

"I have three ships ALL LOADED WITH GOLD
And sailing for dry land,
And a hundred and twenty sailor boys
Will be at your demand."
---

She took her babe upon her knee,
And kissed it one, two, or three,
Saying, "Stay at home, my darling sweet babe,
And keep your father's company."

She called her babe up on her knee
And she kissed it two and three
Said stay at home my sweet little babe
And keep your dad company

She picked her baby up INTO HER ARMS
And give him kisses three,
Saying, "Stay at home with your pap
For he IS GOOD company."
---

Willard inserts the following verse at this point:

She dressed herself in rich way
In riches to behold
And every street that she passed through
She showed her glittering gold
---

They had not sailed four weeks or more,
Four weeks or scarcely three,
When she thought of her darling sweet babe at home,
And she wept most bitterly.

She had not been at sea two weeks
I am sure it was not three
BEFORE THIS MAID BEGAN TO WEEP
And she wept most bitterly

They had not sailed a week an' a half,
I'm sure it was not three,
BEFORE THIS MAID FOUND FOR TO WEEP,
And she wept most bitterly.
---

Says he, "Are you weeping for gold, my love,
Or are you weeping for fear,
Or are you weeping for your House Carpenter,
That you left and followed me."

Is it for my gold that you weep
Or is it for MY STORE
Or is it for the house carpenter
That you NEVER CAN SEE ANY MORE

"Is it for gold that you do weep,
Or is it for MY STORE?"

[Degreenia conflates this verse with the next one.]

"It's for my darling little babe
THAT I NEVER WILL SEE ANY MORE"
---

"I am not weeping for gold," she replied,
"Nor am I weeping for fear,
But I am weeping alone for my sweet little babe,
That I left with my House Carpenter."

Tis not for your gold that I weep
It is not for your STORE
But its ALL FOR THE LOVE of my sweet little babe
THAT I NEVER CAN SEE ANY MORE.
---

At this point, the broadside inserts the following verse, missing from all other versions:

"Oh, dry up your tears, my own true love,
And cease your weeping," cried he,
"For soon you'll see your own happy home,
On the banks of old Tennessee."
---

They had not sailed five weeks or more,
Five weeks or scarcely four,
When the ship struck a rock and sprung a leak,
And they were never seen any more.

She had not been on the sea three weeks
I am sure it was not four
Before that ship she sprung a leak
And she sank to rise no more

They had not sailed three weeks and a half,
I'm sure it was not four,
When A HOLE BROKE OUT IN THE BOTTOM OF THE SHIP
And their bones was heard no more.

[Notice the differences in the last line.]
---

A curse be on the sea-faring men,
Oh, cursed be their lives,
For while they are robbing the House Carpenter,
And coaxing away their wives.

Bad luck Bad luck to sea fare MAID
And cursed be all your lives
For robbing of the House Carpenter
And STEALING away his wife

The Degreenia version does not have the curse.
---

There is certainly enough agreement between both the Willard and Degreenia versions with the broadside to suggest that they were at least influenced by the broadside tradition, if not derived from it. However, there is always the question as to whether or not all three of these versions (including the broadside) may have come from an earlier source. It is also interesting to note the agreements between Willard and Degreenia that disagree with the broadside, suggesting other common sources. And finally it is important to notice what is unique to the broadside, and what is unique to Willard and to Degreenia, again suggesting multiple sources. Certainly Willard shares with other earlier sources the verse about dressing up in riches and the use of "slavery." Degreenia shares with other versions the use of "Dundee" and "I have three ships all loaded with gold." He also omits the opening two lines about "Well met..." and the ending "curse verse."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 10:17 AM

John

I wonder if you'd seen this article: The Ancestry of "The House Carpenter" A Study of the Familial History of the American Forms of Child 243 - Alisoun Garner-Medwin JAF, 1971. I don't have access to it, but it might be an interesting read.

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 10:19 AM

Oops - that should have been Gardner-Medwin.

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 10:24 AM

Should have looked further - there's a copy of the article on the Bluegrass Messenters site: Ancestry of the House Carpenter (though the OCR is a bit patchy!)

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 11:20 AM

Mick, thanks very much for that reference. I had not seen it and look forward to reading it. By the way, after getting hold of the Heylin book, I checked and the online article does contain the whole book, with the exception of the notes and an appendix containing copies of all of the versions having the "heaven/hell" verses, and a pretty good bibliography. There is also a page of followup on Heylin's quest for the source of Dylan's version, which I will discuss a bit later. There is also an in depth review of the Heylin book by a Christopher Rollason from 2004 here (you have to scroll down to find it):

http://nicolamenicacci.com/bdcc/bookreviews.pdf

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 11:23 AM

Part VI

I now want to look at five more of our versions from the Northeast that seem to have been influenced by the Andrews/De Marsan broadside, or the tradition underlying that broadside, as well as some other distinct traditions. These five versions come from Sidney Luther NH, Belle Richards NH, Ruth Moses (from her father)NH, Orlon Merrill NH, and slightly different from Alice Mancour of VT. The first four, all from NH are the most similar to each other.

Two of them, (Luther and Richards) begin with the familiar "Well met, well met my own true love" line from the broadside. The version from Mancour in VT also begins with this line but has "my pretty fair maid." The other two (Moses and Merrill) begin with the second verse from the broadside, "I might have married a king's daughter fair." The other two NH versions also have this verse. All four of the NH versions share in common the response of "If you could have married a king's daughter fair, I'm sure you are to blame," which is not a part of the broadside. The Mancour version, while structured a bit differently does have the line "You are very much to blame." Clearly this response comes from some other source than the broadside tradition.

All five of these versions share in common, over and against the broadside version, the phrase "the grass grows GREEN" (instead of "high"). Two have "sweet Willy," one has "sweet Valley," one has "Sweet Dundee," and one has "sweet Guerlee." Of course the broadside has "old Tennessee."
Three (Richards, Merrill, Moses) have "slavery" instead of "misery." Interestingly enough, both the Luther version and the Mancour version omit this verse, and the following verse about what she will be offered if she leaves. Moses, Richards and Merrill then have some version of the "dressed herself up" in riches verse. Both Moses and Richards share the line "She dressed herself in scarlet red." Merrill simply has her in a "stylish dress." We have noticed before that this verse surely comes from a different and probably early source.

All five of these versions have in common the lines "Is it for my gold you weep, or is it for my STORE?" And the answering verse, which is omitted by both Mancour and Moses, also has the word "store." The broadside has "Or are you weeping for fear," etc.   The broadside has "But I am weeping for my sweet little babe, That I left with my House Carpenter." Moses, Merrill and Richards all have some variation on "That I never shall see any more." The other two omit this verse entirely.

All five versions have the ship springing a leak but with no mention of striking a rock as in the broadside. And the four NH versions end with some form of a "curse." Three of them curse "all sea men" and Moses curses "all womankind, Likewise all men alive,..." The VT version from Mancour omits the curse. In all, only seven of our versions end with a form of curse. In addition to the four mentioned here and the one mentioned in the previous section from Willard, both Edwards and Couchey of NY have "curse verses."

So, while it may have been possible that these five versions were at least influenced by traditions going back to the Andrews/De Marsan broadside, they have obviously come under other influences as well. The commonalities would perhaps suggest a fairly stable textual tradition lying behind these differences. There were probably alternate versions already in circulation perhaps before the printing of the broadside and certainly afterwards.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 01:57 PM

Part VII

There is another group of four versions plus a fragment that I want to consider. They are from Elmer George VT, Lena Bourne Fish NH, Allen Johnson ME, and Mrs. Cornwright NY, along with the fragment from Mrs. Wales VT, learned from her grandmother, Mrs. Bissell. The four complete versions have an amazing number of things in common, which are not in the Andrews/De Marsan broadside, definitely suggesting some other source.

Setting aside the Wales fragment for moment, the other four all begin with almost identically the same verse:

"Well met, well met, my pretty fair maid,"
"No so very well met," said she,
"For I am married to a house carpenter,
And a very fine man is he;

Fish has "a ship carpenter" instead of "a house carpenter." What is interesting about this is not only that they all have the same wording, but that this is a conflation of the opening two verses from the broadside. They also use "pretty fair maid" instead of "my own true love."

Three of the four versions, from Cornwright, Johnson, and George use a repetition of the last two lines of each verse as a refrain, which is somewhat unusual in ballad singing. This is also true for the versions by Reynolds ME/NH, Luther NH, and Mancour VT.

All four versions have "the grass grows GREEN, On the banks of a sweet VALLEY." Three of them (Johnson, George, and Fish) use the word "entertain" in the third verse, "What have you there to ENTERTAIN me on/with?" And three of them (George, Fish, and Cornwright) use the word "slavery" instead of "misery". Johnson has "And keep me company." Three (George, Fish and Johnson) have almost identical fourth verses:

"Oh, I have ships all in the bay [Johnson has "a thousand ships"]
And plenty more upon land,
Five hundred and ten of as fine young men.
They are all at your command."          [all four agree on these last two lines]

There is strong agreement from all four versions on the next verse about "kisses three." Then two of the versions (George and Johnson) have almost identical versions of the "riches" verse that they insert at this point:

She went upstairs to dress herself
Most beautiful to behold.
'Twas then she walk-ed the streets all along,
And she shone like the glittering gold.

All four versions have almost identical accounts of the lady mourning most bitterly (Fish has "most pitifully"). They all agree on the "six weeks at sea":

She had not sailed six weeks on the sea,
Oh, no, not more than three,
Before this fair lady began for to mourn
And she mourned most bitterlee.

And the fragment from Wales has almost the same thing:

They had not sailed a month or more,
A month or scarcely three,
When she began to weep and lament
And to mourn most bitterlie.

All four versions and the fragment agree on the next verse about "weeping for gold':

"O do you weep for gold, " he said,
"Or do you weep for me,
Or do you weep for your house carpenter
That you left to come with me?"

And then, all five of these versions agree that she is weeping FOR the House Carpenter, "But I do weep for my house carpenter..." The four main versions add the baby.

All five versions have the strange line in the last verse about a hole in the ship springing a leak:

When a hole in the ship, and the ship sprang a leak   (Wales)

When a hole in the ship it sprang a leak,    (Johnson)

At the bottom of the ship there sprang a leak    (Fish)

Before that hole in the ship sprang a leak   (George)

When a hole in the ship caught a leak,    (Cornwright)

And finally, none of these five versions have a curse verse. They all end with the ship going down.

When you put these five versions along side of each other they clearly look like they have a common source. All four of the main versions agree on six points that are not in the broadside version. And there is some agreement on up to ten points that are not in the broadside. It seems to me that these five versions are the strongest and most coherent evidence we have for an alternate source different from the Andrews/De Marsan broadside for this ballad in the Northeast.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 02:31 PM

Part VIII

There is one other version from the Northeast left to consider. It is the one published by Flanders from Edith Ballenger Price of Rhode Island, collected in 1945. Supposedly, she learned it " as a young girl from "a lady living in Massachusetts, whose forebears came from England." For the sake of this discussion I am going to reprint this version.

The Daemon Lover

"I've seven ships upon the sea,
Beaten with the finest gold,
And mariners to wait upon us;
All this she shall behold."

She set her foot unto the ship,
No mariners did she behold;
But the sail was o' the....
And the mast o' the beaten gold.

They hadna' sailed a league, a league,
A league but only one,
When she began to weep and to mourn
and to think on her little wee son.

"Now hold ye tears, my dearest dear;
Let all your weeping be:
For I'll show you how the lilies grow
On the banks of Italee.

They hadna' been a league, a league,
A league but only two,
When she beheld his cloven foot,
From his gay robe thrusting through.

They hadna' sailed a league, a league,
A league but only three,
When dark and fearsome grow his looks
And gurly grow the sea.

"Now hold your tears, my dearest dear,
Let all your weeping be
And I'll show ye how the white lilies grow
At the bottom o' the sea."

They hadna' sailed a league, a league,
A league but only four;
When the little wee ship ran 'round about
And never was seen more.

It is not hard to see how different this version is from everything else we have looked at! I have to say that I tend to agree with what Bryan Peters has said above about this version. He says that the transcription

"from Edith Price of Newport, RI, looks an awful lot like a collation from the two versions of the ballad in Motherwell's 'Minstrelsey'. If the singer did indeed give it the title 'Daemon Lover', that alone would be grounds for suspicion."

I have not gone back through all of Bronson but I think this is the only American version of this ballad to contain many of these unique characteristics. I would suggest that either it came over quite late in written form, or was appropriated directly in written form by somebody in Massachusetts. It seems suspicious to me as well. I would welcome some counter arguments. In the next post, I will put up Clinton Heylin's counter argument so you can see what he thinks about this text.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 02:35 PM

Part IX

Here is what Clinton Heylin has to say about the Price text. [a long quote!]

"Establishing the revenant nature of the former lover adds an important dimension to an otherwise mundane tale of temptation and guilt. What it does not afford is an explanation of the supernatural powers with which our 'Dæmon Lover' is endowed on his return. The final verse of the Greig-Buchan text confirms that it is the spirit of 'James Harris' that causes the ship to sink (unlike in the familiar broadside texts); that the storm is invoked by the revenant; and that the white lillies on the banks of Italy were intended to contrast with the white fishes/lillies at the bottom of the sea. Though Buchan's text does not depict the advent of the storm, Robert Scott's North Eastern text does, as do both of William Motherwell's variants, his Minstrelsy text bearing the more authentic tone:

They had not sailed a mile awa,
Never a mile but three,
When dark, dark, grew his eerie looks,
And raging grew the sea.2

Motherwell's nine-verse text appeared in the 1827 edition of his Minstrelsy, Ancient & Modern. An American text, collected from New England by the same indefatigible collector who had previously located the 'George Allis' fragment, suggests that Motherwell's text drew upon an enduring tradition. This eight-verse 'condensation', transcribed in October 1945, despite narrative holes, is an excellent text, another rare rendition to have survived in America without the debilitating input of De Marsan. It also adds an important piece to our jigsaw - the notion of the lady in the song becoming increasingly aware that her former lover is not all that he seems. In the Motherwell-Price text/s encroaching dread consumes the song long before the destruction of the ship.

Thankfully not only did one Edith Ballenger Price, from Newport, Rhode Island, recall that fine verse about "his eerie looks" but she also provided the only American text to date to contain an all-important reference to "his cloven foot." The image of the lady catching sight of 'her lover's' cloven foot is one of the most dramatic snapshots in all of popular balladry. Ms. Price says that she learnt the song from a lady whose family came from England, the only real suggestion that the 'dæmonic' version might have once had a foothold in English tradition. Comparing Ms. Price's rendition with the one in Motherwell's Minstrelsy affords an invaluable insight into how the strings of tradition can preserve the supernatural. The similarities are striking: [here follows a comparison verse by verse]
......
Perhaps one is doing Ms. Price a disservice referring to her rendition as a condensation. Her eight verses accord remarkably well with Motherwell's nine. Perhaps, as the English and American broadsides elected to start the tale in act three, some long-forgotten Scottish wag decided to take Mr. Graves at his word and begin proceedings in "the last act of the play." As it is, Motherwell's reciter and Ms. Price both start and end on the same verse and inbetween agree on all the main particulars (the absence of mariners, the banks of Italy, the cloven foot, the raging sea and a fine 'lingering' quartet that builds to its climax four miles/leagues from shore).
Indeed, the two texts - recorded a hundred and twenty five years and three thousand miles apart - correspond so well that it begs the question: could Motherwell's version, which was after all a published text, have spawned its own rivulet of tradition? I think not. Setting aside the fact that Motherwell's work remained largely unknown outside antiquarian circles (and indeed the text in question Motherwell only apologetically included as a preface for what he deemed the more authoritative version, t'wit that published by Scott), the imagery in Price's rendition is, if anything, more convincing than Motherwell's. In particular, the penultimate verse, slightly Anglicized in Motherwell, rings with an authentic Scottish brogue in Price:

They hadna' sailed a league, a league,
A league but only three,
When dark and fearsome grow his looks
And gurly grow the sea.5

I presume that our New England lady was not in the habit of using the word 'gurly' despite the fact that, when imbued with some vocal gravel, it acquires a fine onomatopoeic quality. That her recollection had an authentic basis can be confirmed by reference to page 297 of George Kinloch's manuscript:

Till grim, grim grew his countenance,
And gurly grew the sea.6

Ms. Price's version also bypasses the strange offer made by the revenant, "mariners to wait upon us" - subsequently contradicted by the lady's protestation, "woe be to the dim mariners/ that nowhere can I see!" In Ms. Price's rendition, "She set her foot unto the ship/ no mariners did she behold." Her second verse, though it finds no real parallel in Motherwell, replicates - almost word-for-word - verse nine of Scott. The absence of mariners on this spectral ship is a lovely touch, one whose disappearance (sic) from tradition is much to be mourned."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 03:24 PM

Following you with interest, but way too busy just now to contribute. I'll be back!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 04:29 PM

I'm looking forward to that, Brian.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 09:31 PM

John

I was just looking over this and I'm not clear if you have the Philadelphia broadside or not (at a quick look through the text you seem to be asking for information on it, but I couldn't tell if you had a copy or not).

That version is available in the Bodleian Broadside collection, with the imprint: J.H. Johnson, Song Publisher, Stationer And Printer, No. 7 N. Tenth Street, 3 doors above Market, Philadelphia, Pa., dated ca1860.

The image is at: House Carpenter - Philadelphia version

Looking it at, the text is the same as the LOC np,nd version with what looks like one exception - the version at the Bodleian has House Carpenter at the end of the very last line, while LOC seems to have House Carpenters. The border also appears to be different. I'd guess that the LOC copy is either a slightly altered version from Philadelphia or derived from the Philadelphia or the same source.

(apologies if you do have it and I've missed the info above).

Mick

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 13 Jan 12 - 10:25 PM

Mick, thanks very much for this link and this information. I did not have the Philadelphia version anywhere. There was the De Marsan version from the LOC and an "unnamed" version from the LOC. I had been assuming that these were mostly all the same. But I am very glad to actually be able to see the Philadelphia one. It is apparently the oldest one in print in the U.S. I think you are right about the difference between the LOC and the Bodleian copies.

I have been working my way through the "Ancestry of the House Carpenter" article. The jumbled up printing of it is a bit maddening, but I am working at it. It definitely has some interesting information in it. Here is one important note:

"It is true that these New England versions are very like De Marsan, and indeed we know that a copy of DeMarsan's broadside came north, for there is one in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society at Worcester, Massachusetts,..."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 14 Jan 12 - 05:21 PM

Part X

Now that we've got the versions from the U.S. in some kind of order, perhaps it would interesting to look at the two Canadian versions that we have in our "collection." One comes from Newfoundland, collected by Kenneth Peacock in 1961 from Mary Ann Galpin of Codroy, and the other one comes from Toronto, Ontario, from LaRena Clark, also 1961. She recorded her version on "LaRena Clark: A Canadian Garland," Topic 12T140.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about these two versions which they agree upon and which is different from all of our New England versions is that the woman ends her part of the story by committing suicide. Here is the verse in Clark's version:

She had not sailed on sea three weeks,
I'm sure not sailed on four,
Till overboard her fair body she threw,
And her weeping was heard no more.

And here is the Galpin version:

'Twas just a short time after that, I know,
This lady she was distracted and forlorn.
Then she soon ended her life into the sea
By jumping overboard at the height of the storm.

The Galpin version is quite developed in relation to all of our other versions and shows local reference and creativity and is in a more literary style. The story has been made "coherent" with an orderly beginning and end. The young wife of a ship's carpenter in England is seduced away from her family by a rogue from Newfoundland who promises her the good life back there. She goes with him but several days out on the return trip she begins to have major regrets. She weeps and then jumps overboard. Back in England, when the ship's carpenter learns what has happened, he "swore and tore his hair," and cursed all mariners and especially the sea captain who stole away his wife.

The Clark version is much closer to the oral traditions that underlie our New England editions. It begins with the "Well met," and ends with the curse verse. The "king's daughter" has become a "queen's daughter." And the seducer has "refused a crown of gold." There is the response about "If you could have married a queen's daughter, Then she should have married thee," which leaves out the "blame" part. He's going to take her "down where the grass grows green, On the banks of the River Dee." And she asks how he will "keep her from slavery?" In this version, the lady has "two pretty babes, for whom she weeps. While Clark's version has the overall structure of the broadside version, it has a lot of the tell-tale signs that we have been seeing before that are different from the broadside, and probably comes out of the same streams as many of the versions just over the border to south in NY, NH, VT, and ME.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 15 Jan 12 - 03:24 AM

Nice work -- good quality Mudcat stuff!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 15 Jan 12 - 10:48 AM

Hey Gibb, thanks. I was wondering if this song ever shows up on board an actual ship anywhere? It has nautical themes. Of course many versions end by cursing all sea-faring men, but still, it's a good story. I have not come across it in any of the sea-going materials I have looked at. But we know that it went to sea at least once when it crossed the Atlantic. And more than likely it came over many times and might even have gone back the other way as well (Alisoun Gardner-Medwin).

In her, now forty-year old - this is hard to believe! - article, entitled "The Ancestry of "The House-Carpenter": A Study of the Family History of the American Forms of Child 243" [which Mick Pearce has noted above], Gardner-Medwin suggests that the Scottish versions of this ballad may have come over, before the American Revolutionary War, with the Scottish tobacco traders, who came over from Scotland specifically to run the tobacco trading facilities in the port cities on the Atlantic coast, especially in Virginia and the Carolinas. Apparently they never intended to be permanent residents and many returned to Scotland when the war broke out. But if they were conveyers of the ballad, they certainly had constant access to sea going folks.

Gardner-Medwin says: "I believe that this ballad flourished here for at least two generations before it was printed [in 1858 & 1860]." And she says in the paragraph just before this statement that the printed "...English form of the ballad is by no means the only ancestor of the American "The House- Carpenter " and perhaps this essay will show that the connections with the Scottish side of the family are even stronger ." She goes on to suggest that there are "definite Scottish element(s)" to be found even in the De Marsan broadside, pointing back to earlier oral tradition. Gardner-Medwin says:

"...there are three verses in De Marsan that could not have come from the English B [version in Child] and are like verses found only in Scottish tradition. They are verses , where she takes the baby on her knee and kisses it, and the two verses in which the seducer says he will take the woman to a promised land (verses 3 and 10). Therefore there must have been influence from Scotland in the ballad before De Marsan printed it.....Where and when this mixing of the English broadside tradition and the Scottish oral tradition took place cannot be shown from this evidence alone, but I think that further investigation of the American tradition will show that it took place well before 1860 and probably in America."

At this point, I have to admit that I have only recently, with the advent of this particular thread, dived into any scholarship on this ballad. I am wondering if there is any more recent study of this ballad in its American context, since Gardner-Medwin's 1971 article. I know that forty years may or may not be very long ago in an academic context, but is there anything more recent? In addition to the Heylin book from 1999? Taking a quick look at Heylin's rather extensive bibliography, nothing leaps out at me. There is an article by David Atkinson on "Maarriage & Retribution in 'James Harris'" in FOLK MUSIC JOURNAL vol. 5 no. 5, 1989, but I would assume this does not focus on American versions.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 15 Jan 12 - 09:09 PM

With regard to the version in the Flanders collection from Edith Ballenger Price of Newport, Rlhode Island, entitled "The Daemon Lover", which is so completely different from all of the other versions found in the Northeast, and probably throughout North America, and about which Brian Peters and I have expressed some skepticism, Alisoun Gardner-Medwin says in her article:

"It is possible that a copy of this book [the 1812 edition of Sir Walter Scott's Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border] was brought to America and provided a source for some versions. It is interesting to note here that one of the versions collected by Helen Hartness Flanders [the Price version] is so close verbally to F that it must have been taken from Scott's book not long before it was recorded. [23] The influence of Scott's book can be observed in a comment found in a letter from Margaret Reburn of Iowa, to Child in 1881, where she mentions that she has seen a volume of Scott's Minstrelsy. Apart from a volume of songs, whose title she could not remember, this was the only printed book containing ballads that she had seen.[24]"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 15 Jan 12 - 09:25 PM

In her discussion about comparing the examples in Child taken from the Scottish oral tradition with the De Marsan broadside (and other American versions, including a number from New England) Gardner-Medwin says, specifically with regard to the verse about putting and and parading riches:

"The other element which is present in the Scottish group and in some American variants, but not in De Marsan's broadside, is the finery that the young woman dresses up in before she leaves. (This finery should be distinguished from his offer to her of fine clothing.) Compare this verse from the Scottish side with the American one.

CHILD D, vs. 13

She's drawn the slippers on her feet,
Were covered o'er with gold,
Well lined within wi velvet fine,
To hide her frae the cold.
(See also D4 and perhaps E8)

BRONSON 2, vs 4

She dressed herself as in a yellow rose,
Most glorious to behold,
And she walked the streets all round and about,
And shined like glittering gold.

(See also Bronson 9, 25, 27, 32, 33, 34, 47, 50 etc.)

It will be observed that this element is frequent in America. It is found in versions from the Southern Appalachians, and interestingly enough, it is also found in New England. Helen Hartness Flanders collected many versions of this ballad, and Tristram P. Coffin, who wrote the critical analyses for the collection, felt that the Flanders versions were much affected by the popularity of the song in print. He says:

"Most of the texts follow De Marsan's song, which is similar to Child B, rather faithfully, but he probably took his version from established oral tradition." [25]

It is true that these New England versions are very like De Marsan, and indeed we know that a copy of De Marsan's broadside came north, for there is one in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society at Worcester, Massachusetts, nevertheless six of the sixteen versions published by Helen Hartness Flanders contain the verse describing the young woman who dresses herself up, and walks up and down, and who looks like "a glittering queen."[26]

This image could have come to New England directly from Scotland or more probably from the oral tradition current in America, since the Flanders versions are closer to the Southern Appalachian ones than to the Scottish. While it is possible that other American broadside versions existed and were later lost, evidence points to a widespread currency of the ballad in American oral tradition, quite apart from the influence of the De Marsan broadside."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 16 Jan 12 - 10:36 AM

One of the remarkable characteristics of the Andrews/De Marsan broadside printed in Philadelphia and New York City in 1858/1860 is the reference to "the banks of the old Tennessee," referring to the Tennessee River. We have noted that the only Northeastern version that has this that we have been able to find so far is the one from Jennie Devlin.

In her essay, Gardner-Medwin has a very interesting theory about "the old Tennessee." Rather than try to summarize it, I will print another long quote from her article:

"Let us look more closely at the mysterious land to which the young woman is beckoned. In America the use has changed markedly, from the seducer saying "I will shew you how the lilies grow, On the banks of Italy" (FI2) to "I will take you where the grass grows high, On the banks of old Tennessee" (De Marsan 3 ). It is evident that when this was printed this place-name had already undergone the changes noted by W.Edson Richmond.' [13] There are, as will be seen from his article, a great many American substitutes for "Italy." Some of them are nonsensical, but sound like it (for example, "sweet Da Dee," "sweet Willie"); some represent a memory that the journey was a sea journey ("salt water sea"); some show an attempt to place the song in a geographical context familiar to the hearers, and of these "Tennessee" is an example. It has a similar rhythm to "Italy" but is otherwise not very like it; moreover the Tennessee is a river, and it is obvious from the context in De Marsan that a sea voyage of three or four weeks is contemplated. It is interesting to note in this connection that there was a belief among the early settlers that a mysterious western sea lay only as far to the west of the Appalachian watershed as the Atlantic lay to the east. There is an early map made by Farrer in 1651 that shows this slim American continent. [14] In 'A Perfect Description of Virginia', Farrer puts this belief into words' [15] He says:

"From the head of the James River above the falls ... will be found like rivers issuing into a south sea or a west sea, on the other side of those hills, as there is on this side, where they run from the west down to the east sea after a course of one hundred and fifty miles; but of this certainty Henry Briggs, that most judicious and learned mathematician, wrote a small tractate and presented it to the noble earl of Southampton, the governor of the Virginia Company in England anno 1623.

Briggs says there is a sea "on the other side of the mountains beyond our falls which openeth a free and fair passage to China."[16]

These geographical tracts were of course written at a much earlier date than that from which we have the ballad, and by the time the De Marsan broadside was printed it was well known that the Tennessee was a tributary of the Mississippi. However, since I am suggesting that the ballad arrived in America some considerable time before the 1860 printing let us look for a possible clue to the date that the river acquired the name "Tennessee". Here again maps are very helpful. In 1760 A New Map of the Cherokee Nation was published; the river there is called "Cherokees or Hogehegee River," and there is a settlement on it called "Tunnassee."[17] In a sketch map of about 1783 the river is called "Tenefee"; [18] by 1794 both the river and the state are called "Tennassee." [19] If I am correct in my belief that the ballad came to the Appalachian Mountains before 1775, then it would seem not impossible that the name "Tennessee" was substituted for "Italy" because the old belief in a western sea just beyond the mountains had not yet been superseded by the correct knowledge of the geography of the rivers and perhaps also because Tennessee represented the mysterious and beckoning west.

The position within the ballad which this verse occupies is significant. In the Scottish versions it appears late in the story, after the young woman has discovered what the situation is and has started to weep. In many American versions it appears right at the beginning, as if this were the one promise that would persuade the young woman to leave. In De Marsan it appears in both positions; a closer look at the broadside shows that there is a significant change in the words the second time this verse appears.

De Marsan 3.
"If you will forsake your House-Carpenter,
And go along with me,
I will take you to where the grass grows high,
On the banks of old Tennessee!"

De Marsan 10.
"Oh, dry up your tears, my own true love,
And cease your weeping," cried he,
"For soon you'll see your own happy home,
On the banks of old Tennessee."

The first six lines are very like the Scottish versions and they appear in the American position and again in the Scottish one, after she weeps. Indeed the first two lines are close to the Scottish (see FI 2). However, all hint of mystery has evaporated in the last two lines: the demon lover has become the most ordinary of seducers and all he offers is "Your own happy home." This is far from the Scottish tradition, and indeed is not often found in American versions. Nearly all of the versions published by Bronson consistently give this promise as the inducement to leave and omit it from the end of the story. [20] Three of his examples( 54, 71, and 94) repeat the verse at the end, and only 94 changes the words as De Marsan does. If De Marsan had been influential in the spread of this ballad in America, one would expect to find a larger percentage of versions following this particular change."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 16 Jan 12 - 04:05 PM

A part of our discussion has focused on the influence of the Andrews/De Marsan broadside on the traditions of "The House Carpenter" that have shown up in the New England region. We have certainly seen that there must have been other sources involved in the formation of these traditions. But the question of "when?" is very difficult to figure out. In her article, Gardner-Medwin is suggesting that these earlier traditions may have been Scottish and that they may have preceded the printing of the broadsides by several generations, and in fact may have established the oral traditions from which the broadsides were taken. Here is an example of two arguments that she offers in this direction.

"One or two minor points also suggest that when this ballad was published in 1860 it was taken from a tradition that had been flourishing in America for a long time. The change from Ship Carpenter to House Carpenter is perfectly understandable since American houses are largely made of wood, yet it would seem likely that if this ballad had not been current inland for some time before it was taken up by De Marsan there might have been less reason to change the name, for even as late as 1869 there were wood carpenters working in the shipbuilding industry of the coastal towns. In the American tradition there is a marked increase in the length of the voyage mentioned. One is only told of a short sail in the British versions: compare these phrases "not been long upon the sea" (Child B); "a league but barely three" (C); "a league, a league, A league but barely twa" (D); "A mile awa, Never a mile but one" (G); with De Marsan "They had not sailed four weeks or more, Four weeks or scarcely three."Many American versions have this long voyage and it is possible that this reveals that the singers remembered the long and dreary voyage across the Atlantic that they or their forebears endured when emigrating. By the end of the nineteenth century the trans-Atlantic voyage was rather shorter than this, perhaps two weeks on the average, so the change must have taken place well before the printing of the De Marsan version."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 16 Jan 12 - 04:13 PM

Here is a bit more of Gardner-Medwin's argument for earlier, Scottish influence on the "House Carpenter" tradition in America. A question that arises out of her comments would be how did these Scottish-influenced traditions move from the Southern Appalachians north into the New England region? I think we are always assuming that everything was moving south and west and never the other direction. But surely that can't be accurate.

""The internal evidence from the words of the American versions of Child 243, which we have been examining, seems to point to a very strong Scottish influence. There is also a certain amount of evidence that the ballad was current in America some considerable time before it emerged in print in 1858. How far back can we reasonably make it? On the evidence furnished by the words themselves we can only say that there must have been several streams of influence from Scotland, and it is probable that the song had been in oral tradition in America for several generations of singers before the end of the nineteenth century."
....
"Ian Charles Cargill Graham shows that between 1707 and the American Revolution merchants of the port of Glasgow made themselves the chief traders of tobacco between Virginia and Europe.[30] As well as carrying tobacco these merchants established stores in the Fall Line towns of Virginia that became centers of trade and, I suggest, also of cultural exchange.[31] Moreover, although the factors themselves went back to Scotland at the time of the Revolution, there were settlers who stayed."
....
"Therefore, it seems reasonable to suppose that ballads from Lowland Scotland could have come to the Southern Appalachian area by one of two routes, either directly from Glasgow in the eighteenth century or via Pennsylvania after a stay of a generation or two in Ireland. With regard to the particular song under discussion it, was published as a broadside (Child B ) too late (1757) for it to have come via Ireland so it seems probable that this was a song that traveled to America with the Scottish tobacco traders."
....
"I am inclined to think that the Scottish element in the ancestry of "The House-Carpenter" is rather stronger than the English, and that the ballad must have migrated to America in several versions (the Scottish versions differ appreciably among themselves as well as from Child B) which have inter-related among themselves in America between 1775 and the present day. "
....
"I believe that the ballad known in Scotland as "The Demon Lover" and in America as "The House-Carpenter" came to the Southern Appalachian region from Scotland in the middle of the eighteenth century. There it was current in oral tradition, being changed in small details, such as the name" Tennessee" which reflects the local geography as known at an early date, and surviving until the twentieth century as a living entity. It gathered up elements, at times from other ballads, and in its turn influenced them. It was picked up in the mid-nineteenth century and printed at least twice( 1858 and 1860), and these printed versions combined with the oral tradition to reinforce some of the changes."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 17 Jan 12 - 04:23 PM

With regard to versions of "The Daemon Lover"/"The House Carpenter" found in either Newfoundland or Nova Scotia, Clinton Heylin has a nice summary of the evidence, or rather the lack of evidence. Kenneth Peacock's version from Newfoundland that we have discussed above is the only example found so far. Here is what Heylin has to say about this:

"The notion that American strains of 'The Dæmon Lover' were transplanted during the early waves of emigration, i.e. no later than the mid-eighteenth century, finds a form of reverse corroboration in the almost total absence of renditions from the coastal outposts of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. These two English colonies were inhabited by British settlers in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries but in the case of Newfoundland the early settlers came almost exclusively from the Western counties of England - Hampshire, Dorset, Devon, Cornwall and Somerset - where the fishing trade had been a mainstay of the local economy for a thousand years. A list of settlers on the southern shore, compiled in 1675, contained only English names. The Irish began to settle there from 1713 on but Scots remained few and far between.

Nova Scotia, despite its name (New Scotland), bestowed on it in 1622 by Sir William Alexander, was not an inviting prospect for settlement until the French renounced all rights to the territory after the Seven Years War. As W.S. MacNutt observes, "The advance-guard of the great immigration of Highland Scots to Nova Scotia did not arrive until 1773, when The Hector came to Pictou via Philadelphia."7 Not until the period 1801-1803, when eleven ships from Scotland arrived at Pictou, can "the great immigration" be said to have begun in earnest.

These two territories, early British settlements, as isolated by the sea as any Virginian mountain-range, might have been expected to yield a commensurate amount of British popular ballads. The yield has, if anything, been disproportionately small. Maud Karpeles, who visited Newfoundland in 1929, later wrote, "I had hoped that Newfoundland might yield a wealth of songs comparable with the riches that Cecil Sharp and I had discovered in the Southern Appalachian Mountains a decade earlier."8 In fact, Karpeles found just 24 Child ballads - many badly mangled by tradition - in her excavations, compared with the 45 Child ballads Sharp and she had found in the hills of Eastern America. 'The Dæmon Lover', which had yielded 22 renditions in the Appalachians, failed to yield even a solitary fragment in Newfoundland. Kenneth Peacock's even more thorough excavations in the Fifties yielded but a single 'House Carpenter', and that an English broadside derivative. In Nova Scotia, neither Helen Creighton nor W. Roy MacKenzie succeeded in tracking down one 'Dæmon Lover'. Creighton's haul was a mere eleven Child ballads. MacKenzie reluctantly admitted, in his The Quest Of The Ballad, "I have not ceased to cherish the hope that I may yet extort from some crafty singer the admission that he knows 'a line or two' of 'James Harris' ... but so far I have had to content myself with the ... unsatisfying knowledge that [it was] ... once current in the northern part of Nova Scotia."9"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 17 Jan 12 - 04:40 PM

I don't recall any sea versions; in a way, it is the quintessential anti-sailor song! :-) The sailor's song would usually be the "opposite" scenario, where the sailor returns to find his beloved taken another.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 17 Jan 12 - 05:36 PM

In a footnote to our ongoing discussion, I would like to add a suggested correction to one conclusion that Heylin draws. In this section, Heylin is discussing an important text from Virginia, collected by Winston Wilkinson from Miss Tyrah Lam of Elkton, Virginia in 1935. He suggests that this text is an important link between the English broadside and a separate English oral tradition:

"Though Clay Walters' rendition [from Kentucky] also includes two of the three verses in De Marsan not in Diverting Songs, it omits any reference to the "banks of Italy." A complete text containing all three 'orally-acquired' verses - drawn from a stream independent of either broadside - has been collected in twentieth century America. It suggests that a collision between (a derivative of) the English broadside and an entirely separate British oral tradition - resulting in the De Marsan derivative - occured in America before any naturalizing process had taken hold. This rare example of a British undercoat intact can be found in Winston Wilkinson's manuscript, housed at the University of Virginia. Collected by Mr. Wilkinson himself from a Miss Tyrah Lam in Elkton, Virginia in 1935, eight of the first eleven verses accord with the first eight verses of De Marsan. However, verse five preserves our banks of Italy:

If you will leave your house carpenter,
And go along with me.
I'll take you where the grass grows green,
On the banks of sweet Italy.15

The denouement, though, entirely omits the moralizing coda, concluding with the increasingly familiar visions of heaven and hell: (vss. 12 & 13)

What hills, what hills, my false true love,
What hills so black and blue?
The hills you see are the hills of Hell,
Awaiting both me and you.

What hills, what hills, my false true love,
What hills so white as snow?
The hills you see are the hills of Heaven,
Where you and I can't go.16

The reader may have started to think that there is nothing unusual about the hills' appearance in American tradition. Not so, my friend. Of the 86 versions in Bronson that qualify as more than fragments, just 14 feature these verses, barely more than those featuring "the banks of Italy."

The Lam text is central to any understanding of the relationship between the American 'House Carpenter' and its British parent. Though verses five and eight correspond to two of the three De Marsan verses unreplicated by the earlier English broadside, the reference to "the banks of sweet Italy" confirms a source preceding the De Marsan transliteration. The surely symbolic couplet, "She turned herself three times around/ And looked at her babies three," otherwise unreplicated in American tradition, suggests perhaps an Old World superstition designed to ward off evil. The reference in the third verse to having "forsaken those crowns of gold," may occur in A Collection Of Diverting Songs but it also crops up in Scottish oral tradition - in Motherwell (Child E), as "I refused the crown of gold," and in Buchan (Child C), as "I despised the crown o' gold," while the uniquely English description of golden slippers and gilded boats remains absent.

What we have in Lam are three verses that cannot be traced to either broadside - yet also occur in Walters' and Dylan's renditions - integrated into a version containing nine of the De Marsan verses. The similarities between Lam's and Dylan's renditions are striking (all of Dylan's ten verses have their equivalent here, save for his attack of amnesia at the end of verse six), though Lam has lost the anachronistic "fee" and Dylan has not. But it is unlikely Dylan had recourse to a direct derivative of Lam. In Lam's rendition the otherworldy status of the "false true love" (an oxymoron in the true sense) remains implicit at song's end, nor does Dylan provide an equivalent to Lam's second verse, which yields another core constituent of the ballad's most ancient tradition:

O hold your tongue of your former vows,
For they'll bring bitter strifes.
O hold your tongue of your former vows,
For I have become a wife.17

This begs an obvious question: what former vows?"

These comments are helpful in understanding and giving some context to the Andrews/De Marsan broadside that we have been looking at. However, the correction I want to suggest has to do with Heylin's comment about Dylan not having had access to the Lam manuscript.

As Heylin says, this manuscript is a part of the Winston Wilkinson collection at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, VA. It is very probable that a friend of Dylan's not only had access to this collection and this version of "The House Carpenter," but worked with it. This was Paul Clayton (Worthington), who

"... attended the University of Virginia where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree, with honors, in English Literature. He continued with his graduate studies at the University of Virginia, studying folklore under professor, folklorist, and archivist Arthur Kyle Davis, Jr." (University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Library Archives and Special Collections)

He lived in the mountains west of Charlottesville, up Brown's Cove, for a while. So it is entirely possible that Dylan did have access to this version through Paul Clayton Worthington. Here is a link that says a little bit more about Paul Clayton Worthington and Dylan.

http://expectingrain.com/dok/who/c/claytonpaul.html

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 11:19 AM

In the note above where Heylin is talking about the Canadian versions of "The House Carpenter" he says:

"In Nova Scotia, neither Helen Creighton nor W. Roy MacKenzie succeeded in tracking down one 'Dæmon Lover'. Creighton's haul was a mere eleven Child ballads."

Heylin does not mention a version that Creighton did find in New Brunswick, which was listed in the Roud index earlier in this thread, that I have overlooked. Here is the information on it:

"House Carpenter, The  (from IRELAND, W.E. of Elgin, New Brunswick
first line of song: 'Well met, well met, this pretty fair maid,) — September 1954"

Does anyone happen to have access to this? I can't find it online anywhere so I'll to look for it next time I'm at the library, which won't be for awhile.

Also, there are two other versions that are mentioned above for which we have no lyrics:

Mrs. Myra Daniels of East Calais, VT (This was not in Flanders' ANCIENT BALLADS. Perhaps it is in another of her books, which will have to wait until I get back to the library).

And, the version from Mort Montonyea of Sloatsburg, NY. This is on a LOC recording and I have not been able to find a transcription of it.

If anyone has access to any of these, please post the lyrics for us and send them to me and I will be glad to do it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 18 Jan 12 - 12:04 PM

Hey, Gibb, thanks for getting back to us on this. You suggestion that this ballad is actually an inversion of what would likely be sung by a seaman is very interesting. One of the issues that we have not addressed in this discussion is who did sing this song. In his book, DYLAN'S DAEMON LOVER, which we have been referring to quite often, Clinton Heylin has a whole chapter on this, entitled "(xi) "Knitters in the sun," in which he suggests that this ballad was sung by women. He says:

"Though the knitters, milkmaids, shepherds and yeomen of the sixteenth century must have had a common store of ballads and lyrics, the overlap might not have been as great as scholars have perhaps imagined. The themes reverberating through 'The Dæmon Lover' suggest a song whose main appeal would have been to womenfolk. Would a ballad of such supernatural vengeance, which places the focus so roundly upon the woman and her broken vows, suggest composition by a well-versed sixteenth century yeoman (I say compose rather than write to neatly sidestep the contentious issue of whether such ballads were orally composed. I think not, but it does not fundamentally affect my argument)? Would such a song have been adopted by the travelling minstrel? 'The Dæmon Lover' certainly does not come across as a tavern song. On the other hand, the appeal to superstitious "knitters in the sun" dreaming of an escape from the drudgery of daily existence seems self-evident."

In looking over all of the sources mentioned so far on this thread, I find that sixteen are from women and ten are from men. This means that almost two thirds of the our versions were collected from women, with the assumption being that they actually were sung by them.

While Gardner-Medwin definitely focuses her study on what happens to the young woman in the ballad, it (having been published in 1971) predates the general rise of feminist scholarship in academia and betrays no hint of this influence, and thus does not raise the issue of who might have been actually singing this song, leaving intact the assumption that it was being passed along by the men - i.e. those Scottish tobacco traders!

Gibb's point about the ballad inverting the "normal" sailor's theme of some landsman stealing away his wife while he was at sea throws this issue into relief, in that we have a tale about a mariner stealing away a landsman's wife and taking her off to sea with him. But the story is really about the woman going willingly and then having "buyers regret!" It definitely echoes the theme that we find in Child #200, "The Gypsy Davey." And in fact, the Couchey version from NY, sung by Lee Knight, demonstrates this by actually combining the two ballads, almost seamlessly. Here is the Couchey/Knight version:

thread.cfm?threadid=141964&messages=143#3280327

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 19 Jan 12 - 11:43 AM

As a followup on yesterday's note about the roles of women in relationship to this ballad, I wanted to mention an interesting study by Barbara Fass Leavy, called IN SEARCH OF THE SWAN MAIDEN: A NARRATIVE ON FOLKLORE AND GENDER. A good deal of her Chapter 3 entitled "The Devil's Bride" is devoted to "The Daemon Lover"/"The House Carpenter", and she also discusses it within a larger folklore context. She is definitely interested in how this ballad both reflects the feelings and plight of women and also what influence it may have had on both. And her discussion provides a telling critique of the long tradition of male-oriented interpretation of the ballad materials. Here is a link to this chapter:

http://books.google.com/books?id=BytDXeTtHiQC&pg=PA65&dq=%22James+Harris+(The+Daemon+Lover)%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VAgYT4GhIoja0QGHhdW

It is interesting to compare the perspectives of Leavy, Gardner-Medwin, and Heylin. Gardner-Medwin wrote in 1971, Leavy in 1994, and Heylin in 1999. History is never "just history" and the interpretations do change and do depend upon time, place and frame of reference.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 01:23 PM

My post yesterday about "The Devil's Bride" chapter in Barbara Fass Leavy's book IN SEARCH OF THE SWAN MAIDEN, got me to thinking about my own originating story for this thread:

thread.cfm?threadid=141964#3279700

So old Robert Pond was a house carpenter in Dorchester, MA. He died there in 1637. About 55 years later, and 22 miles north there began the infamous Salem witch trials. Witches were accused of being "the Devil's Bride." While it would appear that there was only one North American version of our ballad that actually portrayed the man from the sea as at least supernatural and probably diabolical, it is somewhat ironical that this version supposedly was learned in Massachusetts! This was the version published by Flanders from Edith Ballenger Price of Rhode Island, collected in 1945. Supposedly, she learned it " as a young girl from "a lady living in Massachusetts, whose forebears came from England." Here is the link to that version:

thread.cfm?threadid=141964#3290123

Perhaps the cultural atmosphere of the Massachusetts Bay Colony at the end of the 17th century and the beginning of the 18th century had something to do with why this ballad did not take root there. The Price version probably came over (in a book?) in the early part of the 19th century.

If the poor woman who left her house carpenter had made it back home, there is some likelihood she might have been burned as a witch, if she was from Massachusetts in the late 1600's. And of course, there is a link here to Dorchester! Check this out:

http://www.dotnews.com/hangingjudge.html

As far as I know, Mary Pond, who did marry a sea captain after the death of her first husband, Robert Pond the house carpenter, died of natural causes, probably in Cambridge.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 02:28 PM

http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/~zierke/lloyd/songs/thedemonlover.html

If that's been posted before, my apologies. The 'cat is taking so long to load stuff that I'm giving up for the day.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 04:31 PM

Thanks for the link, GUEST 999. It gives us lyrics from A.L. Lloyd, Steeleye Span, Peter Bellamy and Jon Boden, and a very youtube of "Cara."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: John Minear
Date: 20 Jan 12 - 04:35 PM

That should be "a very nice youtube."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Demon Lover in New England?
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 21 Jan 12 - 06:15 PM

It's taken me a fair old while to read this thread and some of the other documents linked to.

To pick up on the question of whether the Price version was derived from Motherwell: surely the conclusive piece of evidence is the word "gurly", which as Heylin points out is not in either of the Motherwell versions but is in the Kinloch version (Child D). Even if Motherwell was (directly or indirectly) Price's main source, she got at least that one word from somewhere else.

BTW is Edward Ballinger Price a mistranscription of Edith Ballenger Price or was he a real person (presumably related) with another version?

BTW2 I tried searching for the Joe Rae version on the Tobar an Dualchais site and drew a blank. If it was there, it has disappeared.

Richard