FAREWELL REGALITY - Terry Conway (1984)

The Regality and Liberty were areas of local jurisdiction in
Hexhamshire which were granted to favoured individuals,
a practice that dated back to Anglo-Saxon times. Over the
centuries the property passed between the Archbishops of
York and Durham, until in 1572 the Regality and Liberty
were formally transferred to the County of Northumberland.
At this time, most of the privileges belonging to them were
abolished. Sir John Fenwick gained possession of the
Regality in 1632, and later died for the Jacobite cause.


And now it's time to say farewell
And though I hope that we may meet again
And all things may be reet again
We've lived and spent the day               

        We'll cry farewell Regality
        And cry farewell the Liberty
        To honest friends' civility
        To winter's frost and fire
        And there's nowt that I can bid ye
        But that peace and love gan with ye
        Never mind wherever call the fates
        Away from Hexhamshire

And what is time that flies so fleet
But just a bird that flies on merry wings
And lights us doon in happy spring
When winter's neet is past

Aye but the curlew sings her sang
And winds her sorrows doon the Rowley Burn
And drear as winds the hunter's horn
The call is all farewell

And as I set the mossy stones
And do me bits of jobs and gap the dykes
I hear the whisper doon the sykes
Farewell they sigh, farewell

Do I remember? Do I dream?
And did we rightly meet in Viewly Side?
For all this and much more beside
Has got me sore beguiled

But on some golden autumn morn
Or when July is hazing Dipton Slopes
By Whitley Mill or Westburnhope
We'll live and spend the day