06 Jul 05 - 06:17 AM (#1515928)
Subject: Lyr Add: PROUD LADY MARGARET (from Chris Coe)
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Roberto
Here are the corrections as I hear them. You were right about tread above. Also about weel redd hair. This word, in redding comb, came up in the your thread about Young Logie. OED gives the word redd as appearing in the sense of well-ordered or cared-for, so in this sense it's well-kept hair or hair that in the modern usage has been done. In v3 an extra bonnie has been deleted. Throstlecock = the thrush.For Vanity and salt I've put in the modern English; I can't see a case for using the poetic/dialect words when Chris is singing the modern English words. In the penultimate verse l3 I now believe the last word is come as you have (not my possible gone in e-mail. This also agrees with printed source). And in the last verse, l1 I'm fairly certain that she sings hall rather than ha'.
One minor changes that I'm less sure of: In v2 l1 I think she sings riddle, singular, but that's not certain.
Hope that'll do.
Mick
PROUD LADY MARGARET
I have come here to your castle wall
All for the love of thee
And if you will not grant me love
Then this night for thee I'll die
Oh, you must read my riddle – she said
And answer me questions three
And if you read them wrong – she said
Then it's surely you will die
Oh, what's the flower, the very first flower
Springs ower the moor and dale?
And what's the bird, the bonnie bird
Sings on the evening gale?
Oh, primrose is the very first flower
Springs ower the moor and dale
The throstlecock is the bonniest bird
Sings on the evening gale
Oh, what's the smallest coin - she said
That can buy my castles round?
And what's the smallest boat - she said
That can sail the wide world round?
How ever many small pennies
Make thrice three thousand pound?
And many are the small fishes
That swim the salt seas round?
I am your brother John – he said
'Though I know that you know not me
I cannot rest into my grave
All from the pride of thee
For when ye go in at yon church door
With the yellow gold in your hair
It's ye care more for your weel redd locks
Than you do for the morning prayer
If you're my brother John – she said
Then this night I'll go with thee
You've ill-washed hands and feet – he said
For to gan to the clay wi' me
Leave pride, Janet, leave pride, Janet
Leave pride and vanity
To tread the road that I have come
Much changed you must be
Oh, he found her in her stately hall
A-combing her yellow hair
He left her on her sick, sick bed
A-shedding the salt, salt tear
Source: Chris Coe, on LP: Pete & Chris Coe, Out of Season, Out of Rhyme, Trailer LER 2098, 1976.
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