Copied from the above-mentioned web site, the John Jacob Niles Center for American Music at the University of Kentucky School of Music:

Mus 301

Appalachian Music

Dr. R. Pen

FAIR MARGARET AND SWEET WILLIAM

Child ballad # 74, Fair Margaret and Sweet William, is a rather macabre tale of love, jealousy, death, and the supernatural, that is widely dispersed in America.

Charles Frazier' s novel Cold Mountain (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1977) is filled with musical references that create an historical context for the Civil War setting. Pages 253-254 contain a moving rendering of Sara's singing of this ballad. Subsequently Dirk Powell, Tim O'Brien, and John Hermann recorded a CD, Songs from the Mountain (Howdy Skies record HS 1001) that is based on the novel. In this version Tim O'Brien sings Fair Margaret in the traditional unaccompanied style.

Lady Margaret was standing in her own room door,
A-combing her long yellow hair.
When who did she spy but Sweet William and his bride,
As to the churchyard they drew near.

The day passed away and night comin' on,
And most of the men were asleep.
Lady Margaret appeared all dressed in white,
And standing at his bed feet.

She said "How do you like your bed?
And how do you like your sheet?
And how do you like your fair young bride
That's lying in your arms asleep."

He said, "Very well do I like my bed,
Much better do I like my sheet.
But best of all that fair young girl,
That's standing at my bed feet."

Then, once he kissed her lily-white hand,
Twice he kissed her cheek.
Three times he kissed her cold frosty lips,
And fell into her arms asleep.

Well, the night passed away, the day came on,
And into the morning light.
Sweet William said I'm troubled in my head,
By the dream that I dreamed last night.

Such dreams, such dreams as these,
I know they mean no good.
For I dreamed that my bower was full of red swine,
And my bride's bed full of blood.

He asked Is Lady Margaret in her room,
Or is she out in the hall.
But Lady Margaret lay in a cold black coffin,
With her faced turned to the wall.

Tim O'Brien, Dirk Powell, John Hermann