FURTHER PAGES OF MY LIFE FRAGMENTS OF SONG AND STORY I WONDER Whether friends interested in traditional lore can help me to recover the original versions of some songs and carols which float-incomplete, alas !—in my memory from very early days. I transport myself back in thought-well-nigh seventy years. It is winter, and the dark, cold days are bringing Christmas nearer. We hear the shuffle of uncertain feet on the pavement outside the house; there is a pause, and then children's voices are raised in carol and song. I can only set down the carol imperfectly, and I do so in the hope that some one better qualified than I may be able to tell us whence it comes, and perhaps give it in its entirety. We only heard it imperfectly indeed, I am not sure that the children who sang it knew more than a fragment of the original; but clearly the original must have been some metrical version of an imaginary or apocryphal incident in our Lord's infant life. The words which fell upon our ears, as I remember them, were these B "He went down, he went down, To yonder little town As far as the old oak-tree, And there he met some boys and girls And said, 'Will you play with me?' "O no! O no!' said these naughty little boys, So, crying, he ran To the Virgin Mary Ann, They will not play with me."" What more of this carol was sung I cannot recall; but well I know that the singers always hurried on to the practical refrain, which hinted at the Christmas gratuity, and with loud voices they lustily sang as follows "Now bless the master of this house, And bless the mistress true, And all the little children Around the table too Your pockets full of money, and your cellars full of beer, were sung, So over and over again round the square these ditties and it may be taken for granted that the singers did not go home empty-handed. These fragments of Christmas greetings and songs are nothing; but for a long time my curiosity, especially respecting the first, has been piqued, and it would be a satisfaction to meet with the carol in its complete form. Among songs which I heard when I was young, there was one which my Aunt Fanny (Mrs. Lawson) was fond of singing. I never saw it in print: it was only from her singing that I learnt it; but here again I should like to trace it to its origin, and meet with it in a more perfect version than I can give. It was the narrative of a certain wily husband, whose home was in Yorkshire; and the song went in this fashion But Simpkins kissed his loving wife, 'I'm yours till death,' he cried; 'But when, my dearest dear, Will you take another ride?' Tol de rol, de rol, etc." Here is a gruesome tale, which my dear old nurse, Mary Ann, used to tell us, and as she told us it thrilled us with the sense of mystery and marvel; it seemed to open up to us the long and dark road of human wickedness, for it was the first story of crime and the conflict of courageous goodness with evil passion which we had heard. The story was in this wise. In a certain town-Chester, I think-there lived a domestic servant who, three nights running, dreamed the same dream. She dreamt that she was in Wrexham, a town with which, if I recollect aright, she had no connexion. In her dream she saw a house, and in the house a dark cellar-passage. In that passage she witnessed a deed of blood: a lad attacked by a man who bore a large knife in his hand; there was a struggle, and in it the lad's hand was nearly severed from his arm, and then she saw the man burying his victim under a flagstone in the cellar. The thrice-repeated dream produced such a powerful impression upon her mind that she resolved to visit Wrexham and test the truth of her dream. According to the story, she was able to impress others, and to evoke such sympathy from the officials of the town that they permitted search to be made. Guided by the girl, the authorities went to the house she led them to the cellar: she pointed out the flagstone which she had seen in her dreams. The flagstone |