Hampshire Bite- Harvey (VT) 1933 Flanders J
[This is the second ballad with Hampshire instead of Yorkshire (See Barry). The biographic details are apparently wrong. The informant, May Louise Harvey of Woodstock, Vermont (1861-1953) was the daughter of George Henry Harvey (b. 1827) and Rebecca Susan Hoyt (b. 1833) who was adopted by James Greenough and apparently took his name becoming Rebecca S. Greenough. So May Louise was the daughter of George Henry Harvey and Rebecca S. Greenough.
Flanders has Rebecca Hoyt as May Louise Harvey's grandmother. Maybe a geneologist can shed some light because if she was Hoyt's grandmother she would have been born in the 1700s-- taking this ballad back a ways.
Flanders has 15 versions in her Ancient Ballads, many reprinted elsewhere. Coffin's notes are excellent.
R. Matteson 2014]
The Yorkshire Bite (Laws L 1, similar to Child 283)
"The Crafty Farmer," Child 283, is rare indeed in America, though J. Harrington Cox, Folk Songs of the South (Cambridge, Mass., 1925), 166, prints a text close to Child A. In this country, unusual songs of the thief outwitted belong to "The Yorkshire Bite" group. However, there are a number of ballads on the resourcefulness of simple folk in the face of robbery that circurated in the chapbooks and on the broadsheets of the last 250 years, and one called "The Maid of Rygate" (Laws L 2) has also been collected in the New World. Why Child chose one and excluded the others from his select circle is not really clear. In "The Crafty Farmer" the farmer throws an old saddle bag over a hedge and when the thief goes after it rides off on the highwayman's horse. In "The Yorkshire Bite" a boy spreads money on the grass and when the thief dismounts to get it rides off on the highwayman's horse. And in "The Maid of Rygate" a girl, stripped naked by a thief, outwits him and rides off on his horse. All three are much alike in age and quality, as well as in plot. For that matter, "The Yorkshire Bite" and "The Maid of Rygate" go back at least to 1769 when they appeared in Logan's Pedlar's pack, 131 and 133 respectively. "The Crafty Farmer" has not been traced before 1796.
A bite is a shrewd trick played on a dull-witted person like those tricks for which the Yorkshiremen were famous. Vermonters, see Flanders J, evidently felt New Hampshiremen were capable of similar shrewdness.
The Flanders versions are much of a kind and quite like other American texts. For a bibliography to "The Crafty Farmer," "The Yorkshire Bite," and "The Maid of Rygate" in America, see Coffin, 151-2. "The Crafty Farmer" is listed in Dean-Smith, 102 (English) and in Greig and Keith, 236-7 (Scottish). "The Yorkshire Bite" is in Dean-Smith, 55 (English), while that song, and "The Maid of Rygate" are in Laws ABBB, 165-6, under L 1 and L 2 (British and American). See also Child, V, 128-31, for a discussion.
On March 2, 1948, the following story, copied from The Farmer's Almanac for 1860, was sent to Mrs. Flanders by George E. Smith of Takoma Park, Maryland. It bears a striking resemblance to all three ballads and was evidently reprinted from a daily newspaper, The Pennsylvanian, once published in Philadelphia.
The Farmer's Daughter and the Robber
A farmer living a few miles from Easton, sent his daughter on horse back to that town, to procure from the bank smaller notes in exchange for one hundred dollars. When she arrived there, the bank was shut, and she endeavored to effect her object by offering at several stores, but could not get her note changed. She had not gone far on her return, when a stranger rode to the side of her horse and accosted her with so much politeness, that she had not the slightest suspicion of any evil intent on his part. After riding a mile or two, employed in very social conversation, they came to a very retired part of the road, and the gentleman commanded her to give him the bank note. It was with some difficulty that she could be made to believe him in earnest, as his demeanor had been very friendly; but the presentation of a pistol placed the matter beyond a doubt, and she yielded to necessity. Just as she held the note to him, a sudden puff of wind blew it into the road, and carried it gently several yards from them. The discourteous knight alighted to overtake it, and the lady whipped her horse to ger out of his power, and the orher horse which had been left standing by her side, started off with her. His owner fired a pistol, which only tended to increase the speed of all parties-and the lady arrived safely at home with the horse of the robber, on which was a pair of saddle bags. When these were opened, they were found to contain, besides a quantity of counterfeit bank notes, fifteen hundred dollars in good money! The horse was a good one, and when saddled and bridled was thought to be worth as much at least as the bank note that was stolen.
All of the tunes for Child 283 are related, and can be sub-divided into three groups: (1) Britton, Brooks, Flarvey, Davis, Moore, and Williams; (2) Edwards, Merrill; and (3) Moses. Related tunes, and, indeed, tunes for this ballad in any relationship, were extremely hard to find. For the Britton group, see FCB4 p. I19, No. 46, for general relationship.
J
Miss May Louise Harvey of Woodstock, Vermont, sang this as learned from her mother, Rebecca Greenough, who came in 1853 to Vermont after her marriage. This was sung by Mrs, Greenough's grandmother, Mrs. Rebecca Hoyt who lived, near Concord, New Hampshire, when Mrs. Greenough was a child.
H. H. F., Collector
April 26, 1935
Structure: A A B C D E (Z,Z,Z,Z,Z,Z); Rhythm D; Contour:
arc; Scale: Aeolian, then Mixolydian
t.c. C, then B flat.
Hampshire Bite
There liv-ed in London a mason by trade.
He had for his servants a man and a maid.
A Hampshire boy he had for his man
And for to do his business; his name it was John.
Lol-de-dol, lol-de-dol, troddle all,
Lol-de-do1-de diddte all de day.
One morning so early he call-ed for John.
John hearing his voice so quickly did come.
"Take this cow, John; drive her to the fair
For she's in good order and all we have to spare."
(Repeat refrain af ter each stanza.)
Johnny took the cow all out of the barn
And drove her to the fair, as we do learn.
In a little time he met three men
When he sold them the cow for six pounds ten.
They went into a tavern all for to take a drink
And then the old farmer paid him all the chink.
He spoke to the landlady and this he did say,
"And what shall I do with my money, I pray?"