Ewan MacColl and Queen Victoria

Subject: Ewan MacColl and Queen Victoria
From: GUEST,Stavin' Chain
Date: 28 Aug 06 - 03:16 PM

Somebody's winding me up. I've just been told that Ewan MacColl recorded a song praising Queen Victoria. Please say it isn't so.

Subject: RE: Ewan MacColl and Queen Victoria
From: Fred McCormick
Date: 28 Aug 06 - 03:18 PM

I'm afraid it is so, or at any rate, he recorded one about praying to Queen Victoria. The song in question is The Leaves of Life, which MacColl recorded for Riverside on the LP, Great British Ballads Not In Child. The verse you're presumably thinking of goes:

11. 0 the rose, the gentle rose,
And the fennel that grows so green,
God give us grace in any place
To pray for Victoria our Queen.