Robin

With reference to what killed the guy, I was just quoting from BruceO's posting which he referred to indirectly above.

By the way, Holloway and Black state quite clearly that almost all of the broadsides in their book are

... from the 18th Century, and have been reprinted from contemporary or near contemporary broadsides in the Madden Collection."

This collection is currently housed in Cambridge University Library, for which day readers cards are fairly easily obtainable. I'll look for it, given time, if you don't beat me to it.

As another PS, I've seen it stated somewhere that the song is in "Pills to Purge Melancholy". I don't believe this. The source I saw (can't remember where) said it was in D'Urfey's 1719/20 1st Edition. I know this isn't true 'cos I spent 2 hours looking through it and it ain't there. D'Urfey's 1st Edition is, however, the 4th Edition and I've also looked through Playford's 1699/1700 collection (it ain't there) as well as a later edition. Does anyone know whether there is an online index to the various versions - it would save me an awful lot of work (particularly on one or two other projects I'm involved with at present.

:-)
Ian