8 12 16 20 24 As I was ridinge by the way.1 [Page 104 of MS.] As I was ryding by the way, a woman profered me a bagge, & 40tye. cattell more, to stay & giue her belly but a swagge. A pox on the whore, they were but scrapps the cattell had lice, or else perhapps I had light and tooke her by the coney. I had not further rydd a Myle but I mett with a market Maide who sunge, the way for to beguile, in these same words, and thus shee said : "I see the Bull dothe Bull the cow; & shall I liue a maiden still? I see the bore doth brim the sow; I had some hope, & to her spoke, "sweet hart, shall I put my flesh in thine ?" "with all my hart, Sir! your nose in my arse," quoth she, "for to keepe out the winde." Shee ryde vpon a tyred mare, & to reuenge noe time withstoode, I bluntlye asket pro to occupye her; but first shee wold know wherfore that was good. 1 A loose but humorous song.-P. First I met a woman who wanted me. Then I met a market maid who sang that she wanted a lover. I offered myself, and she sold me. I asked to Dulcina.' [Page 178 of MS.] THE first notice of this ballad that Mr. Chappell has found is "in the registers of the Stationers' Company, under the date of May 22, 1615, [where] there is an entry transferring the right of publication from one printer to another, and it is described as A Ballett of Dulcina, to the tune of Forgoe me nowe, come to me soone," the burden of the present ballad: ("Pop. Music," v. 2. p. 771). At v. 1. p. 143 the tune is given; it is to be played "cheerfully." The earlier title of the tune seems to have soon disappeared; for, says Mr. Chappell, v. 1. p. 142, "this tune is referred to under the names of 'Dulcina,''As at noon Dulcina rested,' 'From Oberon in Fairy-land,' and 'Robin Goodfellow.'. . The ballad of As at noon Dulcina rested' is said, upon the authority of Cayley and Ellis, to have been written by Sir Walter Raleigh. The milk-woman in Walton's Angler' says, 'What song was it, I pray you? Was it, 'Come shepherds, deck your heads,' or 'As at noon Dulcina rested?' &c." Mr. Chappell gives a list of eight ballads and songs directed to be sung to this tune, and the last of them is one that shows an earlier person than Rowland Hill (?) didn't see why the devil should have all the good tunes to himself: for "Dulcina is one of the tunes to the Psalms and Songs of Sion, turned into the language and set to the tunes of a strange land," 1642. 6 As att noone Dulc[i]na rested in her sweete & shadé2 bower, in her lapp to sleepe and hower 3; This song is printed in many collections of songs.-P. 2 shady.-P. 3 an hour.-P. But hee her wast still held as ffast as shee was constant to her tune, though neere soe fayre her speechers were, No, he held her fast. "the said kind sight forgiues delight," 32 "What better time than now?" "Be bold," she says. |