The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #73380 Message #2868832
Posted By: Q (Frank Staplin)
21-Mar-10 - 05:24 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req/Add: Nellie Cropsy / Nell Cropsey
Subject: Lyr Add: LEMO (Florella complex)
Belden, in his versions of Florella, gives two melodies. One, from the singing (1912) of Mrs. Chandler of ... St. Francis County, who had learned it as a child some fifty years before....
Belden, in notes, says, "Just what relation our song bears to T. H. Bayly's She Never Blamed Him, which was sufficiently in vogue in Civil War times to be copied into a manuscript ballad-book in Arkansas, is not clear;" a footnote notes that the lines from Bayly's song do not appear in texts of Florella from New England and the British provinces.
Lyr. Add: Lemo
Florella complex, coll. 1920, Kansas.
1
Down in the lonely valley
Where the violets used to bloom
There sleeps one gentle Lemo
Now silent in the tomb.
2
She died not broken-hearted,
Nor of sickness did she fall,
But in a moment parted
From the one who was dearer than all.
3
'Twas on a summer's evening,
As gently fell the dew,
Down to a lonely cottage
A jealous lover flew.
4
'Come, Lemo, let us wander
Down by the meadows gay;
Come, Lemo, let us ponder
Upon our wedding day.'
5
O Edward, I am tired,
I do not wish to roam;
For roaming is so dreary.
I pray you, take me home.'
6
Up stepped this jealous lover
And made one solemn vow;
'No hand on earth can save you,
For I shall slay you now.'
7
Down on her knees before him
She humbly begged for life.
But into her snowy bosom
He plunged the fatal knife.
8
'Oh Edward, I forgive you,
Although this be my last breath,
For I never have deceived you.'
Then she closed her eyes in death.
9
He sighed not when he pressed her
To his young but cruel heart.
He sighed not when he kissed her,
Though he knew that they must part.
Belden, same source as above, pp. 329-330, no tune.