HORN FAIR

This fragment appears in Charles Kightly's The Customs and Ceremonies of Britain (Thames and Hudson, 1986):

If you would see Horn Fair you must walk on your way
I will not let you ride on my grey mare today
You'd rumple all my muslin and uncurl my hair
And leave me all distressed to be seen at Horn Fair.

Oh fairest of damsels, how can you say No?
With you I intend to Horn Fair for to go
We'll join the finest company when we do go there
With horns on their heads, boys, the finest at the fair.

Kightly gives no source or tune.  He considers the song to refer to Ebernoe Horn Fair (West Sussex), which takes place on St. James' Day, 25th July; it was revived in its present form, as a cricket match and sheep-roast, in 1864.  Roy Palmer, however (Bushes and Briars: Folk Songs collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams; Dent 1983/ Llanerch 1999), links it with the better-known Horn Fair of Charlton (Kent, 18th October), which was suppressed in 1874, but has apparantly recently been revived.  Vaughan Williams had a set of the song from Frederick Teal of Kingsfold, Surrey, in 1904:

As I was a-walking one morning in spring,
So soft blew the winds and the leaves growing green,
I met a pretty damsel [all] on a grey mare,
As she was a-riding on to Horn Fair.

I asked this pretty damsel for to let me ride,
"Oh no"; then: "Oh no, my mammy would sigh;
And besides my old daddy would bid me for sure,
And never let me ride on the grey mare any more.

"I can find by your talk you're for one game of play,
But you will not ride me or my grey mare today.
You will rumple my muslin and uncurl my hair,
And I shouldn't be fit to be seen when I get to Horn Fair".

"O, O my pretty damsel, how can you say so,
Since it is my intention Horn Fair to go?
We will join the best of company when we do get there,
With horns on our heads as fine as our hair".

There were the finest of horns as ever you did behold,
There were the finest horns as were gilded with gold;
And ride merry, merry, merrily Horn Fair we did go,
Like jolly, brisk couples, boys, and all in a row.

Another version, from Janet Blunt's ms., was published in The Folk Music Journal (EFDSS, vol.3 no.2, 1976). She gave no source for it.

As I was a-riding all on to Horn Fair,
So green was the meadow and keen was the air:
There I met a pretty fair maid all by the green mere shore,
As I was a-riding all on to Horn Fair.

I said, "My pretty fair maid will you get up and ride?"
"Oh no," says the fair maid, "for I am afraid;
For it's for my old daddy, he'll beat me full sore,
And he'll never let me go to Horn Fair any more".

"It's for your old daddy you need not to fear,
Come sit down pretty fair maid, and I'll buy of your wear,
And away to Horn Fair, my boy, so merrily we will go
To see our jovial company all round in a row."

Malcolm