>> And speaking of Aus., I see Ralphie/Nellie/Chief Laissez Fairy has made yet another comeback to call me a "dullard".

No WAV ... if you care to read Ralphie's posting properly, you will see that he actually came back onto this thread as you asked who other than the one name you mentioned played the cittern. I pointed this out to him, as I know that he does .... hence his return. Out of the 12 line posting the first 11 are solely related to the cittern, the type of music that he uses it for (ie generally not English) etc. Only the very last short sentence, as an afterthought expresses his opinioni that you are a dullard ...I looked that up. I wonder if you did - it's an opinion which I think more than one person on this thread has expressed... and quite often more than once. But whatever the rights and wrongs of that... that was NOT ,as far as I know, the principle reason for Ralphie's return.

As to your rather condescending statement that Malcolm Douglas "seems" (!) to know what he's talking about, I'm afraid that it does suggest yet again that you are _still_ not aware, despite having it more than once pointed out to you, that many of the people posting to this thread are actually authorities in their area, and have studied the subject area that you have dabbled your toes in for most of their lives.(I would hardly call four years acquaintance with the subject an intense study ... particularly not if based on just a few CD's, an encyclopedia entry (what do they usually know?), and the very occasional TV programme, of which there have been scarcely any of relevance)

Oh well, back to trying to perfect my performance of an Irish broadside ballad,collected by an English Victorian folksong collector (oh no, sorry, she was born in Scotland, though she lived most of her life in London), and performed to a duet concertina accompaniment (wonder if that's allowed?)