The English and Scottish popular ballads, volume 5 (of 5)
General
The English and Scottish popular ballads, volume 5 (of 5)
Ballads, English -- England -- Texts; Ballads, Scots -- Scotland -- Texts
Arrived at a grave in a churchyard, the man bids the maid to go in, 2,
4-6, 8, 10-17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 32, 36, 39; she says, You first, 2,
4-6, 8, 11-17, 23, 24, 32, 36, 39; she will first throw him her things,
and then come, 14; she throws in her bundle of things, 1, 5, 23, 24,
26, 32, 36; hands them to him one after another, 6, 7, 16, 17; tells
him to take her by the hands, and reaches out to him the sleeves of
her gown, 2, 12; gives him the end of a piece of linen or of a ball of
thread to pull at, 16, 19; asks him to spread her kerchief in the grave
to make the frozen ground softer, 27, all this to gain time. He tears
her things in the grave, 9, 13, 24; he seizes her apron, clutches her
clothes, to drag her in, 4, 8, 21, 22, 25, 43, 44, 47, 48 (in 4 she
cuts the apron in two, in 8 tears her gown off, in 25, 43, 44, 48, her
apron parts); she runs off, 1-9, 11, 13-17, 20-27, 29, 30, 35, 36, 38,
39, 41, 45, 46, 48, 50; she throws down articles of dress to delay his
pursuit, he tears them, 9, 13, 18, 38.
The maid takes refuge in a dead-house (or house in which there is a
dead body, or two, or three), 1-4, 6, 8, 11-15, 17, 18, 20-22, 24-27,
29, 30, 32, 34-36, 38, 39, 41, 45, 46 (malt-kiln, 5, house of vampire,
16). She climbs on to the stove, or hides behind it, 6-8, 11, 13-16,
21, 24, 26, 32, 34, 36, 39, 41. The dead lover calls to the dead in the
house to open, hand her out, 4, 6, 8, 11, 17, 20-22, 25, 26, 27, 29,
30, 32, 35, 36, 38, 39, 41, 45, 46, 48, 50, 57 (to seize the girl, 11;
to tear her to pieces, 24); the dead man within is disposed to help his
comrade, makes an effort so to do, 11, 29, 34, 41, 45, 46; opens the
door, 6, 21, 36, 39; is prevented from helping because the maid has
laid her cross, scapular, on his coffin, 4, 17; (two dead, because she
has laid her rosary on the feet of one, her prayer-book on the feet of
the other, 32;) the maid throws at him beads from her rosary, which
check his movements until the string is exhausted; the maid puts up
three effectual prayers, 35; Ave sounds, 48; by the maid’s engaging his
attention with a long tale, 38; because his wife or a watcher knocks
him on the head, and orders him to lie where he is, 20, 30; because
his wife has turned him over on his face, 57. In a few cases the dead
man within inclines to protect the maid, 1, 22, 25; the two get into a
fight, 1, 13-15, 17, 26, 36 (quarrel, 7). The cock crows, and the dead
fall powerless, return to their places, turn to pitch, vanish, 1, 2, 3,
5, 8, 10, 11, 13-15, 17, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30, 32, 34-36, 39, 41, 45, 46,
and the maid is saved.[55]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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