The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #82623   Message #1513963
Posted By: Le Scaramouche
01-Jul-05 - 04:01 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Tigery Orum
Subject: Origins: Tigery Orum
Seeking information on this version of the blind man he could see (Marrowbones, Old Woman from Wexford, Tipping it Up to Nancy, etc):

Tigery Orum

There was a pretty young woman and in Oxford she did dwell
She loved her darling husband and another man twice as well

Chorus (after each verse):
To me tigery orum orum and beware of the likes of she
Tigery orum orum and the blind man he can see
Well she went to the doctor shop to see if she could find
Anything at all that would make her old man blind.

"Oh just you get some marrowbones and put them on to boil
And when he suckles the marrow out he won't nothing see at all."

Now the doctor sent to this old man and told him what she spoke.
The husband thanked him kindly and he said he saw the joke.

Well she got a pound of marrowbones and put them on to boil
And when he suckled the marrow out he couldn't see anymore.

"Which now I'm blind and comfortless and here I can't remain
And I think I'd like to drown meself if I could find the stream."

"You poor old man, you blind old man, I well see what you mean
If you'd really like to drown yourself I'll take you to the stream."

He says, "I'll stand on the river bank and you run up the hill
And then run down and shove me in." Says she, "me love I will"

So he stood on the river bank and up the hill she run
And when she run down he stepped aside and headlong she went in.

"Oh help, oh help, me husband dear," so loudly she did call,
"Oh don't you remember that I'm gone blind and can't see nothing at all?"

Now the old man being kindhearted and he knew she couldn't swim
He got himself a very long pole and shoved her further in.

A. L. Lloyd says this in his liner notes:
"This waggish ballad seems to have begun life as a folk tale. It has very frequently been recorded in England, Scotland and Ireland, but for some reason seldom been published. It's also called: The Young Woman of Oxford or (in Scotland) The Wife of Kelso. It was exported to USA and took vigorous root there. A version without the marrowbone-blindness motif was adapted and copyrighted in the mid-19th century under the title: Johnny Sands; as such it was carried to various parts of the States by the Hutchinson family of entertainers. In our text, the point of the marrowbones joke show a bit clearer than usual. To judge by the tune, this version came into England from Ireland. It's a great favourite with children."

But, maddeningly, he doesn't give the source. Is it from a broadside, and the tune, his own?