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22 Mar 02 - 11:23 AM (#674019) Subject: Four and Twenty Ponies From: GUEST,Heely Help! Does anyone know the heritage or more verses to "The Smuggler" Song? My Grammy brought it to America via Australia from either Scotland or Wales. I think that it must be Scottish. It goes... "If you wake at midnight and hear the horses feet, don't be pulling back the blind or looking in the street. Them that ask no questions isn't told a lie. Watch the wall my darling as the gentlemen ride by. If you do as you've been told likely there's a chance, you'll receive a lovely dolly all the way from France with a gown of valencense and a velvet hood, a present from the gentlemen along 0'being good." |
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22 Mar 02 - 11:27 AM (#674025) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: GUEST,Heely Sorry, this sent twice. The refrain is . . . "Four and twenty ponies trotting through the dark, ....baccy for the clerk, laces for the ladies, letters for the spy, just watch the wall my darling as the gentlemen go by." I'm missing some words as you see. Does anyone know it? |
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22 Mar 02 - 11:38 AM (#674036) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: Sorcha Hi, Heely. It appears to be a Kipling poem, lots of information at this page. |
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22 Mar 02 - 11:49 AM (#674048) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: Dave Bryant It's in the DT as A PRESENT FROM THE GENTLEMEN - another of Dick's misleading titles. It's a poem by Rudyard Kipling. I'm not sure if the usual tune is by Peter Bellamy or if it's earlier. |
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22 Mar 02 - 01:05 PM (#674105) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: Desert Dancer Here's the other (simultaneous) thread on this question: click this. John Roberts and Tony Barrand did this song on their cd titled "A Present from the Gentlemen" (Golden Hind Music 1992, GHMCD101). Their setting is from Peter Bellamy. |
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23 Mar 02 - 12:16 PM (#674818) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: Dave Bryant Kipling's Title is "A Smuggler's Song" incidently. |
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23 Mar 02 - 07:40 PM (#675066) Subject: RE: Help: Four and Twenty Ponies From: E.T. I always heard it as "You'll be gi'en a dainty doll, all the way from France - with a cap of Valency (valenciennes, a type of lace)" - more logical, since at the time lace was a VERY profitable smuggling item - ladies coming from the Continent would starve their "muff dogs" to make them smaller and then wrap them in lace and tuck them back in the muff where they wouldn't be inspected. Yeah, it sounds a bit bizarre, but the story lingers and it's just weird enough to have been true once. ET |