ALTHOUGH

The Seaman's Adieu.

"And now a tale of love and woe,

A woeful tale of love, I sing;

Hark, gentle maidens! hark, it sighs

And trembles on the string."

Coleridge's Dark Ladie, 1799.

LTHOUGH the following ballad is also in the Roxburghe Collection, it occurs far on, not belonging to the original collection, but in a late additional volume (iv. 69), beyond reach of the Bd. Soc. reprint for a considerable length of time. It is of a different impression; thus we have good excuse for breaking the self-imposed rule which might have excluded it now. To our Bagford Collection exclusively belongs "Sweet William's Answer to Amorous Betty's Delight," written, and signed, by John Wade (vide ante, pp. 1-5). By him, also, is the song which was thus answered, entitled, "Amorous Betty's Delight; or, No Name can compare unto Sweet William.” 1 Both are given in this volume (under Bagf. Coll., ii. 166), and begin respectively, "Come, all

1 It may not be irrelevant here to allude to Gay's tender ballad, “ Black-Eyed Susan." It was published before 1724 we know, as in that year it re-appeared in the first edition of the Hive, i. 128. It became popular at once, and has deservedly remained in favour ever since; none the less for the subject having been long afterwards chosen by Douglas Jerrold for an effective "nautical drama," retaining the title, and introducing the song. Produced, June 8th, 1829. But, as we see above, "Sweet William" was already a familiar name in 1684-95. Another ballad commences "A Seaman of Dover, Sweet William by Name" (Roxb. Coll., iii. 332, a late Bow-Churchyard copy). We think the present Bagford ballad was not unknown to Gay; who felt a deep interest in our early English songs and melodies. He successfully laboured to bring them back again to the heart of his own countrymen, when the national taste seemed perverted towards foreign vocalists and the bravura style. Our ballad may possibly have helped in suggesting to him another of his best songs, viz.,

'Twas when the seas were roaring,

with hollow blasts of wind,

A damsel lay deploring

all on a rock reclin'd. &c. (1715.)

To its pathetic ending our "Seaman's Adieu" offers a foil, and yet may have given the first suggestion :

All melancholy lying,

thus wail'd she for her dear;
Repay'd each blast with sighing,
each billow with a tear;
When o'er the white wave stooping,
his floating corpse she spy'd;

Then, like a lily drooping,

she bow'd her head, and dy'd.

you pretty maidens ;" and, the Answer, "O! what rare Musick's this?" The group being incomplete if any one of the three were omitted, we retain the present ballad in this its original place, among the other sea-songs, instead of either rejecting it altogether, on account of the rule aforesaid, or reserving it, out of position, to accompany the "Delight" and its "Answer." Whether or not this "Seaman's Adieu was written by John Wade himself, additionally to his two ballads already mentioned, we are not prepared to assert; on the contrary, we scarcely think it probable. Nevertheless, they all may have been intended to be in sequence. The present ballad would come latest, because it mentions the death of both lovers.

The tune mentioned, "Tender Hearts," belongs to "Love's Lamentable Tragedy: when cruel Lovers prove unkind," &c. The music is given on the broadsheets (which are in Roxb. Coll., ii. 272, 437; iv. 21). It is from the same printer and locality as the "Seaman's Adieu," but of date a little earlier. It has been reprinted, at least thrice, viz. in 1723, the Collection of Old Ballads, ii. 232; in 1784, by Tho. Evans, iv. 276; and in R. H. Evans's edition, 1810, iii. 256. Consequently, we need give no more than the first verse :

Tender Hearts of London City,
Now be mov'd with Grief and Pity,
Since by Love I am undone :
Now I languish, in my Anguish,
Too too soon my Heart was won.

The tune of this earlier ballad was declared to be "In the West of Devonshire." The title of the ballad thus commencing is "The Devonshire Nymph; or, the Knights happy Choice" (in Old Ballads, 1723, i. 227). It gives account of one Pretty Peggy; a more fortunate girl than her namesake, who went "over the seas with a Soldier." "The Valiant Trooper and Pretty Peggy," is in the Pepys Collection, iv. 40, signed T. R. A different "Seaman's Adieu to his Dear" is in Euing Coll., No. 324: tune, "I'le go to Sir Richard."

[Bagford Collection, II. 87.]

The Seamans Adieu

to his pritty Betty: Living near Wapping; or, A Pattern of true Love, &c.

Sweet William to the Seas was prest,
and left his Love behind;
Whilst she her sorrows oft exprest
and blam'd the fates unkind.

Swee

They were loving, kind, and pritty; none alive could be more true,

Yet at last how they was crost,

in brief I will declare to you.

He aboard was then commanded,
By no means he could withstand it,
she was left with grief on shore;
Discontented, she lamented,

for the loss of him therefore.

5

10

[In the original there were three woodcuts. The above is the centre cut. The left and right-hand cuts are printed suprà, p. 271. The left-hand cut, moreover, being defective in our Bagford copy, is restored from Roxb. Coll., iv. 69.]

1

Thus their goodly Ship [was] staved,
Nothing that they had was saved
but the lives of only three;
We on shore, may grieve therefore,
to think of their Extreamity.

While their grief they were expressing
Heavens now doth send a blessing,
for a Ship that Sailed by,

Which did see them, and did free them
from that woful Distany.

They were bound for London City,
Where they found his true loves pitty,
thus they did declare indeed;
That William he, was in the Sea,

which made her very heart to bleed.

O my dearest Love, she cryed,
Would I for thy sake had dyed,
thou ly'st rouling in the Sea;
Hear my Ditty, Lovers pitty,

can you now forbear to weep?

O ye Rocks and Waves so cruel,
You have rob'd me of my Jewel,

You have got my hearts delight;
O come seize me, Death, and ease me,
thus she cryed day and night.

Then the Messenger came creeping,
All her friends was round her weeping,
seeing of her misery;

Then she cryed, as she dyed,

love I lo[n]g to be with thee.

Printed for J. Deacon [at the Angel], in Gilt-spur-street.

60

[In Black-letter. Date probably about 1684-95. The Bagford copy has been slashed, mutilated of one woodcut, and misplaced; but is of a different impression (probably earlier) from the Roxburghe copy, iv. 69, which gives the words "At the Angel," and supplies us with the lost female figure with fan, but has never had the male figure, with stick in hand, of our Bagford copy.]

1 In original, the dropped "was" comes in here, duplicating, wrongly.