Aunt Molly Jackson and Robin Hood- Greenway 1956
Aunt Molly Jackson and Robin Hood: A Study in Folk Re-Creation
by John Greenway
The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 69, No. 271 (Jan. - Mar., 1956), pp. 23-38
AUNT MOLLY JACKSON AND ROBIN HOOD: A STUDY IN FOLK RE-CREATION
BY JOHN GREENWAY
FEW people have as much right to sing about Robin Hood as Aunt Molly Jackson. By persuasion (her rejection of the first beatitude would have made the greenwood of Harlan County, Kentucky, a hazardous place for fat monks and friars), by emulation, and by ancestry, she counts Robin Hood her model and patron. Probably she is the more authentic re-distributor of wealth, for the Robin Hood ballads record only one unequivocal instance of economic altruism on Robin Hood's part, unless we include his price-cutting as a butcher in Child 122, his reallocation of the bride in Child 138, and his intention of devoting the proceeds of his piracy in Child 148 to building "an habitation . . . for the opprest." Aunt Molly's career, on the other hand, is full of tales about her taking from the rich coal operators and their agents to give to the poor miners, among whom she worked until she was run out of Kentucky in 1933. Consider, for example, her commissary holdup. During the black days of 1931 in Kentucky, after the miners had struck against the reduction of wages to thirty-three cents a ton and had in reprisal been blacklisted by the operators, Aunt Molly was one of the few stalwart enough to keep life and opposition going. She organized outdoor kitchens, where all edibles, sweets and sours, were put into big pots and made into soup, which was ladled out sparingly according to a strict rationing procedure. This expedient made most efficient use of the community food supply, but succeeded only in postponing the inevitable time when the neighboring farmers could contribute no more vegetables. On one of these harrowing days, when Aunt Molly was walking with her little son, Henry, toward the coal camp, she stopped at the cabin of Daisy Allen, a miner's wife. She saw Daisy's smallest girl sobbing for food, and asked Daisy what she was going to do for the child. "I can't do nothing for her," wailed Daisy, "I don't have any more to eat in the house."
"Is it possible that I will do more than you will for that child?" asked Aunt Molly, and she went on, passing soon the house of miner Bob Stringer, whose wife was trying to stop the crying of her seven hungry children with promises. When she came to the commissary she strode confidently in and greeted the proprietor with an expansive smile that meant money. "Well, Mr. Martin, it seems that no matter how hard times get, I can always find enough to tide me over. Give me twenty-four pound of flour." She gave the bag of flour to Henry and told him to meet her at the tipple. Then she had Martin fill a sugar sack with groceries. With one arm loaded, she began to edge her way out of the store.
"Now, Mr. Martin," she said, "I'll see you just as quick as I can raise $5.90. I have to feed some children, and they can't wait on a collection." "Don't you offer to get out of here without paying," warned Martin, and he started around the counter. Aunt Molly reached under her coat and pulled out the .38 Special that she carried for protection on her rounds through the coal country as a midwife.
"Don't you try to stop me, Mr. Martin, or I'll shoot you six times in a minute," declared Aunt Molly, and she backed out of the store. She met Henry, emptied the food quickly into the community pots, and went calmly home to wait for the sheriff that she knew Martin would send after her.
When Deputy Frank Godwin pushed in her door he shook his head and said, "So you've turned robber." "Oh no, Frank, I'm no robber," Aunt Molly rationalized, and told him what she had done. "The tears came into his eyes," she recalls, "and he said, 'If you have the heart to do that for other people's children, I will pay that bill myself, and if they fire me for not arresting you, I'll be damn glad of it.'"
In Sherwood Forest Frank Godwin would have donned Lincoln green and taken up his bow as one of Robin's yeomen.[1] But however questionable Robin's worthiness of the honor he receives from the socially-conscious, all practitioners of his calling from Hereward to Matthew Kimes who have got into balladry have been men. It is the woman's job to sing about the hero, and so Aunt Molly sings seven ballads about Robin Hood, four of them Child ballads presumably not known among the folk in this country.[2]
Whether or not Aunt Molly is the latter-day Robin Hood she believes herself to be, she is certainly a member of the folk. From the age of four she has been singing traditional ballads passed down in her family for seven generationsin back-country Kentucky. Her voice, when young, was pleasing enough for her to be recorded semiprofessionally by commercial hill-billy companies, and she has the phenomenal memory of the greatest folk singers. But though more than 200 of her records are in the Archive of American Folk Song at the Library of Congress, she is not nearly so well known among folklorists a s she should be, for she has a genius for alienating collectors. More even than coal operators she hates collectors who "fix up" her texts, and it is impossible to avoid offending her in this matter. One takes down a song as accurately as possible, submits the text to her for checking, and immediately receives the fury of her monumental rage for "messing up" the song. She cannot be convinced that she never sings a song the same way twice. Not only words but tunes also change without provocation.
The question of primary interest to folklorists concerning Aunt Molly's ballads is whether they are "authentic," that is, whether they have been preserved through oral tradition. Although they exhibit as much as if not more variation than the other Robin Hood survivals accepted by Professors Coffin and Millar, and despite Aunt Molly's vociferous protestations that she learned them as a child from her great-grandmother, I am convinced that the onlie begetter of these ballads is our ubiquitous Sargent and Kittredge. For that matter, I doubt that any Robin Hood ballads found in America have been received purely through oral channels. Admittedly the broadside hawkers do not seem to have done as well with Robin Hood as they did with Lord Bateman, for a man who is thrashed by every beggar, tinker, and curtal friar he meets is hardly assured of heroic perpetuation. Neverthelesst here were Robin Hood broadsides as well as copies of Sargent and Kittredge in this country. Even Benjamin Franklin complained", I have known a very numerous impression of Robin Hood songs go off in this Province at 2 cents per Book less than a Twelvemonth; when a small quantity of David's Psalms have lain on my hands above twice the time."[3]
Whether Aunt Molly is deliberately trying to deceive, or whether she has convinced herself that these ballads were learned in her childhood is a matter hard to decide, since even her prodigious memory is exceeded by her imagination. To confirm my
suspicion that the Sargent and Kittredge one-volume compilation of the Child ballads was the source of Aunt Molly's knowledge of the Robin Hood pieces, I wrote to Mary Elizabeth Barnicle, one of the early collectors of Aunt Molly's songs. "Yes," Miss Barnicle replied, she had lent Aunt Molly a copy of the book in the early thirties. "I was scraping the bottom of the barrel so far as her memory of the British ballads went and lent her the book in the hope that she might find something that would revive further memories. In a few days she came padding back to tell me that she now remembered some RH ballads. She sang them, more or less verbatim, as she had found them in the Child book."
Aunt Molly will be furious if she hears this. She insists that she learned these as a four-year-old from her great-grandmother, Nancy Robinson, who was then ninety-two. She maintains also that it was a tradition in her family that many of the Robin Hood ballads were written by her paternal ancestors, the Garlands, before they came to America in the eighteenth century. She says that she remembers her great-grandmother often humorously referring to her great-grandfather, William Garland, as a "Northumberlander," and there is only one other English shire to be preferred to Northumberland if we wish to accept Aunt Molly's story concerning the provenance of her ballads. Finally, Little John himself was a Garland!
LITTLE JOHN GARLAND AND ROBIN HOOD
(Child 125: Robin Hood and Little John)[4]
(154:2)
1. Of Little John and bold Robin Hood
A story to you I will tell;
Which being rightly understood,
I am sure will please you well.
2. When Robin Hood was about twenty years old
He met with Little John;
They had a fight, and Robin Hood
Was tumbled in the pond.
3. Now Little John was large and strong
He was seven foot tall;
And always when he struck a man,
He always had to fall.
4. Now I will tell you how they first met
If you will listen awhile,
For this is one joke among all the rest
I am sure it will make you smile.
5. Now Robin Hood said to his jolly bowmen,
"I want you to stay in this grove,
And carefully listen to hear me call
While through the forest I rove.
6. 'We have had no sport for fourteen long days,
So out looking for excitement I go;
And should I get beat till I cannot retreat,
My horn for you loudly I will blow."
7. Then Robin Hood shook hands with his merry men all
And bid them at present goodbye;
Then by the side of a brook a journey he took
And a tall stranger he happened to spy.
8. They happened to meet on a long narrow bridge
And neither of them would give way;
Said bold Robin Hood as proudly he stood,
"I will show you the Nottinghams' play."
9. Then from his quiver an arrow he drew,
A broad arrow with a long goose wing;
Then Little John replied, "I will sure tan your hide
If you offer to touch your bowstring."
10. Said brave Robin Hood, "You say that you would,
But if I ever bend my bow,
I will shoot a dart right through your proud heart
Before you could strike me one blow."
11. "You talk like a coward," said Little John Garland,
"With a bow and a sword as you stand;
You could shoot at my chest, but sir, I protest,
I don't even have a staff in my hand."
12. "I am not a coward," said bold Robin Hood,
"And the name of a coward I scorn;
And to prove you do lie, my bow and sword I'll lay by,
And the truth of your manhood I shall try."
13. Then Robin stepped over to a thicket of trees
And chose him a staff of red oak;
And over to Little John Garland he stepped
And these are the words that he spoke:
14. "You see my staff is large and tough;
Now here on this bridge we will play;
And if you knock me in, we will say you have won-
Now, stranger, what do you say?"
15. "With all of my heart," Little John replied,
"I am too proud to give in
As long as I'm able to handle my staff,
And believe me, I'm sure I will win."
16. So they started the fight, and they struck left and right;
Robin Hood made his oak staff ring.
Then Little John said, "You must be repaid;
I shall give you the very same thing."
17. Then Little John gave Robin a lick on the head
That started his blood to flow.
"Fight on, stranger," said bold Robin Hood,
"You are a brave good fighter, I know."
18. Then thick and fast Little John mended his licks
And faster his anger did grow;
Then with a scornful look he tumbled
Robin in the brook
About fifty feet below.
19. "Tell me, brave fellow, where are you now?"
Little John with laughter cried.
"I am under the bridge," said bold Robin Hood,
"And drifting around with the tide.
20. "I must acknowledge you are a strong brave man;
With you I would like to be friends."
Then to the bank of the brook Robin did wade
And with Little John Robin shook hands.
21. Then Robin Hood put his horn to his mouth
And with it he blew a loud blast;
Then came his bowmen in green, most brave to be seen,
And they said, "We heard you at last."
22. "What can we do, good master, for you?"
One of his bowmen cried.
'You are wet to the skin; where have you been?"
Then Robin Hood replied,
"This good man that you see has been fight with me,
And he tumbled me into the tide."
23. "He shall not go scot-free," the bowmen said.
"Do not touch him," Robin replied;
"For I do declare he is as stout as a bear
And we need such good men on our side.
24. "I am your true friend," said bold Robin Hood,
"So please don't be afraid;
You are a brave man as I understand
And I'm proud of the part you have played.
25. "These men are my bowmen that come at my call,
I have three score and nine;
And if you'll agree to stay here with me,
I will make you a bowman of mine.
26. "Now what do you say? You have nothing to fear,
I will teach you to hunt deer and bear;
I will always see, if you stay here with me,
You always will have equal share.
27. "I will give you my hand, you will be my top man,
And always my friend, I declare;
My offer is good," said bold Robin Hood,
"Now Little John, what do you say?"
"Since you put it that way, with you I will stay,
And we will live from the fat of the land.
28. "They call me Little John, but as you can see,
I am not little at all;
You will find lots of men much smaller than me-
You see, I am seven foot tall."
29. Then Robin and Little John walked hand in hand
And to Robin's wardrobe they did go;
Then Robin Hood dressed Little John in the best
From his head to the tip of his toe.
30. Then in his hand Robin Hood put a fine bow;
"As an archer you'll be one of the best;
We will take from the rich and give to the poor,
You'll never need for gold and silver any more.
31. "We will take gold from the priests and bishops and monks
While they slumber and snore;
As long as bishops and monks has gold in their trunks
And we are able to open the door.
We will live good ourselves with good food on our shelves,
And give lots to the needy and poor.
32. "We will live here and eat deer and bear meat
Like squires and lords of renown,
And as long as our life shall endure I am sure
With plenty we shall always be found."
33. With music and dancing they finished the day
And Little John uniting, did celebrate;
And Robin rejoiced at the top of his voice
Because he had found a true mate.
34. Little John and Robin Hood remained true friends
Until brave Robin Hood's death;
And on Little John's chest, as I have heard it said,
Is where bold Robin Hood drew his last breath.
35. And again I have heard that old folks of England said,
And after brave Robin was dead,
That Little John Garland helped place the stone
At bold Robin Hood's head.
It will be seen that Aunt Molly's version of this ballad borrows the introductory stanza from Martin Parker's "A True Tale of Robin Hood" (Child 154) and then parallels "Robin Hood and Little John" (Child 125) rather closely to stanza 27, omitting stanzas 29 to 34 of the Child version (the episode of the christening), and picking up the story again from Child 35 to 39. She omits eight of Child's stanzas (16, 29-34, 39), telescopes four of his into two of hers (his I8th and 19th become her 18th; his 22nd and 23rd become her 21st), and adds five entirely new stanzas of her own (24, 28, 31, 34, and 38). Aunt Molly's version is thus four stanzas shorter than the Child text. The rime parallels the Child version in 17 stanzas. Aunt Molly drops the third line internal rime, the hallmark of Robin Hood ballads, in 14 stanzas, but of the stanzas retaining internally-rimed lines, four are newly devised.
Metrical irregularity has never meant much to Aunt Molly, and she has made no effort to resolve the inconsistency of her frequent six-line stanzas. They are always disturbing to the editor, but even Child had to put up with them, concluding that couplets of half-forgotten stanzas often attached themselves to other complete stanzas. [5] There are several significant features in Aunt Molly's version: her introduction of economic allusion, characteristic of her songs and ballads; the inclusion of the tradition that Little John was the only member of Robin's band present at the fatal phlebotomy and that he helped set the famous headstone; and the omission of the christening episode. Both of the other two American versions of this ballad that have been printed drop the anti-climatic jest of the baptism, which emendation Edwin Kirkland adduced as evidence that the folk often improved the ballads they received. [6] I should like to cite this as a third example of conscious change due to critical sensitivity, but it is more likely that the substitution of "Garland" for John's traditional surname of "Little" necessitated the dropping of the christening episode in the present ballad.
Although Aunt Molly's version is further from the Child text than either of the two variants that have been published as authentic survivals, [7] there does not seem to be any doubt that the Child text is the source of Aunt Molly's ballad.
In "Little John Garland and Robin Hood" the name "John Garland" is a superficial addition, but in "Robin Hood and Allen a Dale" (Child 138) the surname becomes a fundamental part of the rime of one stanza.
ROBIN HOOD AND ALLEN A DALE
(Tune: "Rocky Mountain Top" [Foggy Mountain Top])
1. I will sing for you a true love song,
To me it sounds so good;
It is a true story of Allen Dale and his bride
And the outlaw Robin Hood.
2. Robin Hood was sitting alone one day
In the shade of a green bay tree;
He saw a young man come riding along
And he wondered who he might be-
He was dressed like a king or a lord
Or a baron of high degree.
3. Then Robin Hood went out in the lone green wood
To take a walk next day;
He looked up and saw the same young man
Come traveling along the way,
But the clothes he had wore the day before
He had now cast away.
4. Then Robin Hood went to his gallant men
And to them he did say:
"The man we saw yesterday afternoon
Has passed again today,
But his clothes looked bad and he looked so sad
Like his plans was rearranged.
5. "He has sat down to take a rest
Under the green bay tree;
Now you go down and capture him
And bring him over to me."
6. Then up stepped Little John Garland;
"How do you do," said he;
"I have orders from my master Robin Hood
To bring you along with me."
7. Then up stepped another one of Robin Hood's men,
Nick, the miller's son;
Aunt Molly Jackson and Robin Hood
Saying, "You had better come along with us now,
So do not try to run."
8. 'What does your master want with me?
I have done no wrong."
'You will soon learn what he wants with you,
So you had better come along."
9. When he come in before brave Robin Hood
To him young Robin said:
"Are you sick, young man, or are you scared,
What makes you look so bad?"
10. "I am not sick, I am not scared,
As I may seem to be;
A rich old knight has broke my heart
By stealing my true love from me."
11. "How much will you give me," Robin
Hood said, "In gold or ready fee
If I will capture your true love again
And bring her back to thee?"
12. "I have no money but five shillings and a ring,"
He said in bitter tears;
"I was to be married to a girl
I have loved for more than seven years.
13. "I have no gold to give you, kind sir,
As you can plainly see;
But I will be your slave till I go down in my grave
If you will bring my love back to me."
14. "How many miles is it to your true love?
Tell me with a smile."
"I will swear to you by my body and soul,
It is only five short miles."
15. Then Robin Hood rode with all his speed
He was dressed up like a king;
He rode till he come to Nottingham town,
Then he heard the church bells begin to ring.
16. Then Robin bowed low, and the bishop then said,
"Tell me who you may be."
"I am a harper," said bold Robin Hood,
"And the best in the North Country."
17. "You are quite welcome," the bishop then said,
"Your music pleases me."
"I will play no music," Robin Hood said,
"Till the bride and the bridegroom I see."
18. The next come in was a wealthy knight,
Who was both gray and old;
And by his side was a fair young girl
With hair like ringlets of gold.
19. "This old gray knight is not fitting for her,
And him she shall not wed;
The bride shall choose her own bridegroom-
Stand back!" Robin Hood said.
20. Then Robin Hood put his horn to his mouth
And blew it one-two-three;
Then twenty-four bowmen bold and strong
Came leaping over the lee.
21. Then they come marching into the church
With their arrows and their bows;
The man in front was Allen a Dale
And to Robin he bowed low.
22. "Is this your true love?" said Robin Hood;
"It is," young Allen Dale said.
"Get ready at once," said Robin Hood,
"This day you shall be wed."
23. "That shall not be," the bishop said,
"For the old knight has claimed her hand;
And the knight's bride this girl shall be,
For this is the law of the land."
24. Then Robin Hood pulled off the bishop's coat
And put it on Little John Garland;
"Now you can take the old bishop's place
And marry Allen Dale to his darling."
25. When Little John went into the choir
He spoke out loud and rough;
Seven times he asked, "Who gives this bride away?"
As if three times was not enough.
26. "I do," said bold Robin Hood,
With a loud and angry cry,
"And the man that takes her from Allen Dale,
That moment he shall die."
27. Then Allen Dale was married to the girl he loved,
And the bride looked as happy as a queen;
They rode away to the merry woods that day,
To live among the trees so green-
And that rich old knight vanished out of sight
And never any more was he seen.
Superficially it would seem that Aunt Molly's version of "Robin Hood and Allen a Dale" and the Child text are very close, for each has the same number of stanzas (27), the rime coincides in 17 stanzas, the principal incidents are similar, and the last
15 stanzas of each are parallel. However, Aunt Molly has made many changes, some of them fundamental. The identification of Little John as one of her ancestors is of course no more than an amusing insertion, though the rime it necessitates in stanza 24
("Garland" and "darling") is delightful; but the other changes are more important in considering whether folk re-creation is degenerative. Aunt Molly's opening stanza, unlike the very general introduction in the Child text, tells precisely what the ballad is to concern; her story is more dramatic, her transitions are smoother, her rimes are surer, and her version makes better sense throughout, except for her misunderstanding of the banns. In the Child text there is no reason for Robin's wanting Allen brought before him; Aunt Molly's new fourth stanza explain's Robin's curiosity at the change in Allen's appearance, which is passed over quickly in the Child version. In the Child text Robin's first words to Allen are little more than "Stand and deliver!" and his motive seems to be overt robbery, but in Aunt Molly's ballad Robin asks first the cause of Allen's woebegone countenance, and the request for fee is subordinated to his desire to right the wrong done to the young man. These changes provide a more fluid transition to Allen's background story; in the Child text the transition is abrupt and Robin's offer of assistance psychologically unmotivated.
Except for the brilliant "drooping" in the fourth stanza of the Child text Aunt Molly's language is more natural and effective in every case, though not always a poetic improvement. We might compare, for example, the last two lines of the Child version's tenth stanza, "And chosen to be an old knight's delight / Whereby my poor heart is slain," with Aunt Molly's "A rich old knight has broke my heart / By stealing my true love from me," or the concluding lines in the eighteenth stanza, "And after him a finikin lass / Did shine like glistering gold," with Aunt Molly's "And by his side was a fair young girl / With hair like ringlets of gold." If these alone are not convincing, Aunt Molly's dramatic nineteenth stanza might be put over against its counterpart in the Child text: " 'This is no fit match,' quoth bold Robin Hood, / 'That you do seem to make here; / For since we are come unto the church / The bride she shall chuse her own dear.' "
"Robin Hood and Allen a Dale" seems entirely dependent onthe Child text, although the four examples of third line internal rime, absent in the original version, are most interesting. It is not usual for folk singers to make the rime scheme more complicated; in Aunt Molly's variant of "Robin H ood and the Beggar"(Child 133 I), for instance, she drops the internal rime in all but four stanzas.
ROBIN HOOD AND THE BEGGAR
(Tune "Wild Bill Jones")
1. Come light and listen you gentlemen
All of a story you would like to hear;
A story true I will tell to you
As soon as you all draw near.
2. In olden times there was a man,
At fighting he was good;
He was an outlaw, as many did know,
His name was Robin Hood.
3. Yes, Robin was a brave outlaw
As many people knows;
He was feared by one and all
His friends and all his foes.
4. One day he mounted on his gallant steed
And said, "Good day, my friends."
With a mantle of green, most brave to be seen,
He left all his merry men.
5. As he rode along toward Nottingham town
A beggar there he spied;
He had a lot of beggar's bags,
But he had lost his pride.
6. An old patched coat with ragged pants
Was all he had to wear;
He was begging pennies on the street,
Both feet and head was bare.
7. "Give me some pennies," the beggar said,
"You seem to be so good."
"I am an outlaw, if you please,
My name is Robin Hood.
8. "Why do you beg? Pray tell to me;
You look so strong and stout;
Lay off your ragged coat, my friend,
And I will try you out."
9. The beggar drew a large, long staff,
And Robin drew his sword;
The beggar gave Robin blow for blow,
And never said a word.
10. "Fight on, fight on," said Robin Hood,
'"Your spirit pleases me."
And every lick that Robin gave,
The beggar gave him three.
11. "Now hold your hand," said Robin Hood,
"With you I will agree;
I'll take your old ragged coat, my friend,
And my mantle give to thee.
12. "Now we will exchange," said Robin Hood,
'Your coat and bags give me;
And my mantle and horse shall be yours,
For your true bravery.
13. When Robin got in the beggar's clothes,
He turned himself about;
Says he, "I like the beggar's life,
For a beggar is brave and stout.
I4. "So now I have a bag for bread,
And another bag for corn;
And one for salt and one for malt,
And one for my blowing horn."
15. As Robin went begging on the streets
He heard a mournful cry;
Three brethren had stolen deer, they said,
And were condemned to die.
16. He went up to the hangman's grounds,
Saying, "I pray you, give to me
Those three yeomen-do not hang
Those yeomen to a tree."
17. "We cannot free those three yeomen,
Their cases is too clear;
They must be hanged on a gallows tree;
They have been stealing deer."
18. Then the yeomen bowed their heads
And begun to weep and cry;
"Cheer up, cheer up," said Robin Hood,
"I swear you shall not die."
19. Then Robin took his blowing horn,
And their arrows was so keen,
He called three hundred brave outlaws
And no longer could be seen.
20. 'What shall we do, Master Robin?" they said;
"We are at your command."
"Shoot east, shoot west," said Robin Hood,
"And do not fear a man."
21. Then they shot east and they shot west,
And blew it one-two-three;
The high sheriff left with all his force
To set the yeomen free.
22. Then away they rode to the shady green woods;
They sang with merry glee;
And Robin Hood took those three yeomen good
As outlaw men to be.
Except for this dropping of the third-line internal rime, the rime in all but two of the stanzas retained in Aunt Molly's text has been carried over from the original ballad.
The Child text of "Robin Hood and the Beggar" is much closer to true popular style than "Robin Hood and Allen a Dale," which preserves most of its broadside jargon, and consequently Aunt Molly's verbal changes are not in every case improvements. In structure, however, her ballad is clearly superior. She has cut the Child text by approximately one-third (22 stanzas instead of 31), and of the omitted stanzas only one (the twentieth, which tells of Robin's passage to Nottingham) adds anything of importance to the story, and one (the nineteenth) contains as lamentable a bit of singer intrusion to be found anywhere in the Child ballads: "And if any more of Robin you'll know, In this second part it's behind."
The most consequential omission, that of stanzas 22 to 25, is a fine example of improvement through folk transmission. These stanzas in Child tell of Robin's visit to the sheriff, a purposeless affair which does nothing but delay the rescue of the yeomen and diffuse the dramatic effect. In Aunt Molly's text Robin goes directly to the hangman (who does not appear in the Child version) and asks the condemned men's release. A notable improvement also is Aunt Molly's new eighth stanza, which gives a reason for Robin's fighting the beggar and a reason for his losing the fight to so unlikely an opponent-two incidents unmotivated in the Child text.
The Whole Life of Robin Hood. The most interesting of Aunt Molly's Robin Hood ballads are those dealing with his parentage, and certainly the one that sounds best in the singing is "The Birth of Robin Hood." One wishes that the early students of Robin Hood had not been so intent on establishing an historical prototype with no bar sinister on his coat of arms that all tangential legendary material was rejected, for this ballad is deserving to be better known than Child's classification of it as Text B of "Willie and Earl Richard's Daughter" allows it to be.
The question of Robin Hood's origin, after centuries of hypothesis and counterhypothesis, will probably never be resolved.[8] The first three centuries of investigation and imagination were devoted to establishing an historical Robin Hood, reaching the
zenith with Stukeley's imposing pedigree, which put Robin in the same family as Crynan and thereby related him to such well-known folk as Malcolm and Donaldbain. But as was observed by Stukeley's adversary, Parkin, the genealogy is "quite jocose, an original indeed."[9] After this high point in the historicity of Robin Hood, thei nevitable decline that overtakes all folk heroes began. By the time Child made his compilation of the ballads Robin not only had been deprived of his elaborate genealogy, but Maid Marian and Friar Tuck h adb eent akenf romh is menye. The debunking of the historical Robin Hood has continued a pace. His most vehement opponent among contemporary writers, Raglan, has taken a way from the old highway man not merely his friar (because there were no friars in England before 1224), all his men except Much, his long bow ("In the assize of arms fixed by Henry II in 1181, bows, whether short or long, are not alluded to as weapons of the period."), [10] and his wife, but most contumelious of all, his name ("Robin" is a diminutive of the Norman "Robert")! Raglan puts a coat of leaves on our denuded hero, turns him out upon the solar road, and helps Frazer carry Sherwood to Nemi, as Robin's reputed kinsman carried Birnam Wood to Dunsinanein, spite of the fact that the May Games were not known in England much before 1500 and Robin Hood was popular two centuries earlier.
Though times have fallen hard upon the main line of the Robin Hood legend, they have fallen harder still upon the tradition carried on in Aunt Molly's birth ballads. All collectors who have had dealings with either text of "The Birth of Robin Hood" have denied it a place in the Robin Hood canon. Even the sympathetic Jamieson, from whose collection Child obtained the A text, said, "This ballad does not belong to the recognized cycle of Robin Hood ballads, but it may be appreciated on its own merits."[11]
Unhappily, the B text, the original of Aunt Molly's "The Birth of Robin Hood," is from the labors of the much-maligned Peter Buchan, "Buchan the Untrusted," Child's poisoner of wells, whose integrity was first impugned in 1835 by an anonymous writer who said, "Of Mr. Peter Buchan's work, one-half seems the compilation of his own brain, fertile in tares and sterile of wheat, and m uch of the other half old and modern ballad verse, unworthy of a printer's type." [12] Apparently only Scott and Grundtvig saw any value in Buchan's work until Gavin Greig salvaged what was left of his reputation in his Last Leaves. Certainly Buchan can be relied upon for the longest text and the most industrious and gratuitous editing a mong the early collectors.
It is doubly unfortunate that his text of the birth ballad has no close analogue. The only accessible parallel cited by Greig as corroborator the Danish ballad, "Medelwold and Sidselille," is merely the story of an illegitimate birth in the woods, an incident of no infrequent occurrence in traditional literature. Most damaging of all, perhaps, are the extremely improbable names, Archibald and Clementine. Child, needless to say, rejected this as a genuine Robin Hood ballad, and gave the hapless Archibald to a more congenial mate, Earl Richard's daughter, insulating it by fifteen ballads from the gathered Robin Hood material. Possibly Child's s ensibilities were offended by the imputation that Robin was illegitimate; at any rate, he contended that the identification of the baby with Robin Hood came through the ballad personage Robin Brown. But in the C text of "Jellon Grame" (Child 90) the baby is called "Robin" after Robin Hood, [13] and it is the usual legendary practice to have the heroics on of low-born parents fathered by someone other than his mother's husband. Since the genealogy of Robin Hood is far from being settled even at this writing, it does not seem entirely a miss to consider seriously the possibility of his being, as Buchan and Aunt Molly contend, the illegitimate son of the Earl of Huntington's steward.
THE BIRTH OF ROBIN HOOD
(Child 102: Willie and Earl Richard's Daughter)
1. Robinhood's father was the earl's own steward
He sprang from some small pedigree
His mother was Earl Huntington's daughter
His only child was she, she, she,
His only child was she.
2. He was got in the earl's own house,
And in a lady's tower;
He was born in the lone green woods
At a sad and dreadful hour. [14]
3. When nine months was near at an end,
The eighth month already gone,
Her cheeks was always wet with tears
When she was all alone.
4. "What shall I say, my love, Archibald,
This day for you and me?
A son asleep in a cold graveyard,
And you may be hanged over me."
5. "What aileth you, my love Clementine,
What makes you weep and moan?"
"You know that I am with child by you,
And the ninth month is almost gone."
6. "Will you go to my mother's bower
That stands on that mountain green?
Or will you go to the lone green woods
Where you will not be seen?"
7. "I will not go to your mother's bower
That stands on the mountain green,
But I will go to the lone green woods
Where I will not be seen."
His only child was she.
8. Then he girded his sword by his side
And took his lady by the hand,
And led her to the lone green woods
Where his lady took her stand.
9. So slowly and sadly did this couple walk
Till theyt raveledt wo miles or three;
His lady was in hard labor pains
And she lay down by a tree.
10. "Oh, g ive me a drink of your cherry wine
To cheer my heart again;
Go bring to me a good midwife
To relieve me of my pain."
11. "I'll give you a drink of my cherry wine
To cheer your heart again,
And I will be your good midwife
To ease you of your pain."
12. "Go far away from me, Archibald,
For it will never be
The father of my unborn child
Will be midwife to me.
13. "Go take your small sword by your side,
Your buckler and your bow;
Go hunt around the green hillside
Till you find me a nice fat doe.
14. "And I will give birth to your child for you
While I am all alone;
And when you have killed me a nice young deer
Straight back to me you'll come."
15. He hunted around until he found
A nice young tender deer;
He killed it with his bow and arrow
And brought it back to her.
16. She pressed her feet against the trunk of a tree
And pulled the grass by her side;
She gave birth to her baby boy,
Then she closed her eyes and died.
17. When Archibald come back to his love,
He sadly bowed his head,
For lying there by the green oak tree
His lady love was dead.
18. The sweet young baby his love had borne
Right lively seemed to be;
"Alas, alas," said young Archibald,
"This mournful sight to see."
19. "Although my sweet baby is alive
This does increase my woe;
Just how to nurse a motherless babe
Is more than I do know."
20. Then he looked east and he looked west
To see what he could see;
He spied Earl Huntington and twenty men
Nearby the green oak tree.
21. Then Archibald he fled away
Among the leaves so green,
So he could hear what might be said
And see what might be seen.
22. The Earl come rushing through the woods
Till he come to the green oak tree;
And there he found his daughter dead-
"Oh God! How can this be?"
23. When he saw her living child
So mournfully did he grieve;
Then he picked up his little grandson
And wrapped him in his own shirtsleeve.
24. He held him closely to his heart
And gently carried him home,
Saying, "My daughter died when you was born
And left to me a son.
25. "And if you live until I die
My fortune yours shall be;
And if ever I find your father in life,
I'll hang him to a tree."
26. He buried his daughter in the old churchyard
As quietly as he could;
And he brought her son to the church that day
And christened him Robin Hood.
To anyone familiar with the turgid Buchan texts, it would be supposed that the greatest changes made in this ballad by folk transmission would be verbal, and this is what occurs in Aunt Molly's version. There is little change in structure; Aunt Molly's ballad is 26 stanzas long, Buchan's 28. She deletes stanza one, which is a bit of introductory indirection; 16, which is repetition with little increment; and 28, a typical Buchan appendage. She adds her new stanza 16, a fine description of the birth which owes something to her experience as a midwife; 24, for which less can be said; and combines the meaningful passages of Buchan's twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth stanzas. Rime is similar in 20 stanzas.
Of the verbal changes, the most notable is her emendation of the meaningless "O for a few of yon junipers" of Buchan's eleventh stanza, which disturbed the editor of the Danish analogue, R. C. A. Prior. [15] Aunt Molly changes this to "Oh, give me a drink of your cherry wine," leaving the junipers for those who run about to births with pots of boiling water. It is interesting to see that Aunt Molly misses the symbolism of the white hind in Buchan's text, and instead of Archibald's waiting to see the spirit of his dead leman flit him by, he must wait for the more prosaic appearance of a "nice fat doe." Aunt Molly's brilliant emendation of the useless junipers loses a little in lustre by her failure to appreciate that a woman about to die in child birth is not particularlyin terested in gorging herself on fat venison. Perhapsw e can salvages ome of Aunt Molly's reputation by comparing several of the other emendations she has made in this ballad with Buchan's originals:
BUCHAN AUNT MOLLY
And born into gude greenwood He was born in the lone green woods
Throm ony cauld winter's hower At a sad a nd dreadful hour
I will be laid in cauld irons A sona sleep in a cold graveyard
As fast as they could gang Where his lady took her stand
Her living child her wi Oh God! How can this be?
"Had far awa frae me, Archibald "Go far away from me, Archibald,
For this will never dee; For it will never be
That's n ae the fashion o our land The father of my unborne hild
And it's nae be used by me!" Will be midwife to me."
Aunt Molly extends the tradition of Robin Hood's illegitimate birth further in two ballads unquestionably of her own composition. [16] The first borrows the early framework of Child I49 ("Robin Hood's Birth, Breeding, Valor, and Marriage"): Robin's grandmother, Lady Huntington, takes him with her to her brother's house on the Christmas of Robin's fifteenth year- "to test his ale and beer," as Aunt Molly puts it. Her real purpose in this last ride together is to tell Robin the circumstances of his birth. She has little to add to the Earl's knowledge of the tragic birth in the woods except that ". . . we found a note that your mother had wrote / . . . and this is all it had to say:/ 'I am going to be married to a hard-working man; / Forgive me, Dad, I pray.'" Robin's mind is disturbed by this knowledge, and he resolves to dedicate his life to helping all unfortunate hard-working men. So, when the Earl dies early the next year, and "The squire was called to make an equal divide / (For Robin Hood was only fifteen), / So it was none other than young Robin's step-grandmother/ That was appointed his guardian [gardeen]," Robin spends his inheritance altruistically". When he had nothing more to give to the poor" he took to the woods, with what results we all know.
Aunt Molly then clears up the mystery of Archibald, whom we left cowering behind the green oak tree, in another ballad set to the tune of "John Hardy." One day while Robin, now a man, is traveling along in the northern woods, he chances upon a log cabin. Curiosity was ever one of his traits, "So Robin Hood pushed open the door / And such a sad and pitiful sight / He neverh ad seen before." " Laying" there upon his bed is an old white-haired man, at the point of expiration. He is "too weak to walk," but "Thank heavens ... he is still strong enough to talk," so he identifies himselfa s the absconded steward of the Earl of Huntington. Gratuitously- the motivation is weak here-he tells Robin of the birth of his son many years before, concluding: "'Oh, how I have prayed that my own dear son / Would find me here some day, / And I could tell this story to him / As I am telling you today.' // Then the tears were falling from Robin Hood's eyes / As he said, 'Your story has made me so sad.' / Then he clasped him in his arms and said, / 'I know you are my dad."' After this bathetic reunion the old man prepares for a happy death: "'My prayer is answered, I am happy today, / I know you are my son; / Now I am willing and ready to die- / Lord, let thy will be done.'"
Except for the framework borrowed from Child I49 and one stanza carried over from "The Birth of Robin Hood," there is no apparent source for these two ballads in folk material, although the frequent internal rimes of the first ballad are in the genuine Robin Hood ballad tradition. They have little to recommend them as folk poetry; they are irregular in rime and meter, prolix and prosaic, and rather mawkish for a person of Aunt Molly's spirit to sing. Still they have an importance beyond their intrinsic worth.
Few will deny that we live in the moribund age of folk creation. Percy lived in the time of harvest; there were still a few ears to be gleaned when Child went over the field; but we, for all our advantages in training, are lucky to find even a few grains for our labors-and then we cannot agree whether what we have found is bread or stones. But though moribund, folk creation is not quite dead. The few pieces that are being added to traditional balladry are admittedly decadent; yet they have enough of the traditional process remaining in them to help students extrapolate in learning how ballads were made and moulded when Burbadge played. Aunt Molly has her deficiencies as a model of the folk composer and adapter: she has had too much contact with urban culture to be acceptable as a pure representative of the American folk; her association with labor organizers and agitators, for instance, has colored nearly all the songs she sings. Nevertheless she is a woman whose early environment and deepest influences were as purely "folk" as it is possible to be in this country and in this century, whose knowledge of the traditional ballad rivals that of any informant yet discovered, and whose talent as a folk composer-if that identification can be accepted for anyone-is far from contemptible. What she has done consciously or unconsciously to these Robin Hood ballads, no matter where she learned them originally, is surely of interest to students of the traditional ballad in turning a little light on an unilluminated corner of our discipline.
NOTES
1 This story is taken from a tape recording of Aunt Molly's tales and songs, made during an interview in 1951. I had pursued Aunt Molly literally from coast to coast before finding her. (She asks that her present whereabouts be kept secret, since she is afraid that her small state pension will be taken from her if unfounded and unthinking rumors that she was a Communist are revived. She might take some small comfort in the knowledge that Robin Hood himself has been called a Communist recently-see The New York Times, I6 November I953: "Indianapolis Argues Robin Hood As a Red.") Aunt Molly was exceedingly reluctant to confide in another folksong collector until she learned that my interest was primarily social and economic at the time; she then very generously recorded for me. She has since sent me much material in manuscript, including the Robin Hood ballads for which I have indicated no tunes. Readers wishing to know more about this fascinating woman might consult pp. 252-274 of my American Folksongs of Protest (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1953) and Ben Botkin's Treasury of Southern Folklore (New York, 1949).
2 Because of its great length I have not included in this discussion Aunt Molly's version of Child 154, Martin Parker's artificial "A True Tale of Robin Hood."
3 A. H. Smyth, ed., The Writings of Benjamin Franklin (New York, 1905-1907) II, I75.
4. Numbers in parentheses refer throughout to parallel stanzas in the Child ballad source.
5. The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (Boston, 1882-I894) III, 132b.
6 "The Effect of Oral Tradition on 'Robin Hood and Little John,'" SFLQ, IV, 15-21.
7 It has always struck me as curious that of these accepted survivals, one was collected shortly
after the publication of the Sargent and Kittredge volume and the other was sung by the wife of a
university faculty member.
8 For a summary of scholarship see William E. Simeone, "The Historic Robin Hood," JAF,
LXVI, (1953), pp. 303-308. Two recent books arguing the "truth" of the legendary hero are
J. W. Walker's The True History of Robin Hood (Wakefield, 1952) and P. V. Harris's The
Truth About Robin Hood (London, 1952).
9 Joseph Ritson, Robin Hood, A Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now
Extinct, Relative to That Celebrated English Outlaw.... (London, I795), I, xxii.
0 Fitzroy R. S. Raglan, The Hero, a Study In Tradition, Myth, and Drama (London, I949),
p. 41.
11 Robert Jamieson, Popular Ballads and Songs ... (Edinburgh, I806), II, xviii.
12 The Songs of England and Scotland (I835), II, 352.
13 But alas, this is also a Buchan text.
14 Aunt Molly repeats the fourth line in the dramatic stanzas, e.g., 2 and Io.
15 Ancient Danish Ballads (London, i86o), III, i.
6 Interested readers may have mimeographed copies of these two ballads in their entirety by
writing to me at the University of Denver.
University of Denver
Denver, Colorado