Daily Growing- Bridget Hall (NL)1929 Karpeles A, B
[My title. From Folk Songs from Newfoundland, 1933; by Maud Karpeles.
The last stanza is from a different informant Mary Eller Snow (B). Snow surely knew most of the rest of the ballad but Hall's text was better for the first stanzas.
R. Matteson 2016]
Song Collecting in Newfoundland: Maud Karpeles, 1929
David Gregory, Athabasca University
Maud was back again in North River on the 18th October, and found a new singer, Mrs. Bridget Hall, who also knew “The False Bride” and supplied her with three other songs: “The Poor Irish Girl,” “Still Growing” (aka “The Trees They Do Grow High”) and “Farewell Nancy,” plus a tune for “Blow Away the Morning Dew.”
"Daily Growing," sung by Bridget Hall, Conception Bay, Newfoundland, October, 18, 1929. Collected by Karpeles.
Now father, dear father, you have done to me some harm,
You've got me married to a lad that's very young,
For I am twice twelve and he's only thirteen,
He's young but he's daily growing.
O daughter, dear daughter, I have done you no wrong,
For I have got you married to a rich merchant's son,
Although you're twice twelve and he's only thirteen,
He's young, but he's daily growing.
O daughter, dear daughter, I'll tell you what we'll do,
We'll send him to the college for one year or two;
We'll tie some bonny ribbon about his bonny hair [or waist],
To let the ladies know that he's married.
As she was looking o'er her father's castle wall,
'Twas there she saw the schoolboys a-tossing of a ball,
'Twas there she saw her own true love, the flower of them all,
He's young, but he's daily growing.
Now she bought him a shirt of the old hanks of vine[1],
She stitched it all over with her own hand,
And as she sat a-stitching the tears came rolling d,own,
He's young, but he's daily a-growing.
1. "shroud of the old holland fine," this last stanza is from Mary Eller Snow.