Mrs Webb didn't live at Malvern, but at Bath. Henry Hammond rented rooms from her while visiting the area. She was from Kings Norton, and had learned her songs in Worcestershire; though county boundaries have changed since then and Kings Norton is now in Warwickshire.


The Beautiful Landlady

I come before you with a blush
My beauty's thought so rare
And from an infant such my charms
They made the people stare
Such a beauty I did grow
Such a beauty I did grow.

My shape was never match'd before
Nor ever will be, poz
And you may guess by what I am
The kind of thing I was.

I learnt my manners so complete
That widows, maids and wives
They all declar'd they never saw
Such manners in their lives.

Now of that house I'm landlady
So you must suppose
And double my attraction, for
I draw both BEER and BEAUX.

My beer I have from Golden Lane
From Booth's too I have in
That filthy stuff I cannot name
Tho' you may call it Gin.

All flock around me and admire
I such a figure cut
The BEAUX they calls me charms Intire
The Ladies say all-butt.

Permit me now to take my leave
And judge from what you see
And then you'll own that Venus was
A different thing from me.


Printed between 1802 and 1819 by J Pitts, Seven Dials, London. Madden Collection, Cambridge University Library.

Quoted here from Roy Palmer, A Taste of Ale. Lechlade: Green Branch Press 2000, 67-68.