Lady Fair- Dusenbury (AR) 1870 Randolph
[From Randolph, Ozark Folksongs (Vol. 1), 1946. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2013]
LADY FAIR
Evidently a corrupt version of "The Suffolk Miracle" (Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1882-1898, No. 272). Campbell and Sharp (English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians, 1917, No. 31) report this ballad from North Carolina and Tennessee. Cox Folk Songs of the South, p. 152) has a good West Virginia variant. Davis (Traditional Ballads of Virginia, 1929), prints several texts from the Virginia collection. Morris (Southern Folklore Quarterly-8 ,1944, p. 162) gives a Florida version with distinctive supernatural elements. A text of "The Suffolk Miracle" which is similar to the present one appears in the Brown North Carolina Folk-Lore Society) collection.
Lady Fair- Sung by Mrs. Emma L. Dusenbury, Mena, Ark., Nov. 24, 7930. Mrs. Dusenbury learned it from Miss Eliza Cooper about 1870, and Miss Cooper inherited the song from her father, who came from Haversham County, Ga.
1. Lady, lady, lady fair,
Many suitors she had there
There was a man of low degree,
Amongst them all she fancied he.
Also her father come to know,
An' forty miles he made her go,
An' there to stay four months an' a day
Till her true love was laid in the clay.
One night she was a-standin',
A-dressin' of her head,
She heard a low an' mournful sound
Sayin' loose them bands that are so tight bound.
She knowed her father gilden well,
Likewise her mother, all safe too,
Sayin' dress up so neat an' fine,
An' ride behind your heart's design.
As they rode on she kissed his lips,
They was as cold, as cold as clay,
Sayin' when we git there a good fire we'll have,
Not knowin' he was from the grave.
They rid till they come to Garland's gate,
An' there he complained his head did ache,
A handkerchief she pulled it out
An' with the same she bound it up.
Sayin' we ain't got but a few more miles to go,
Till I land you in your father's door,
Go in, go in, go safe to bed,
An' I will see your horse is fed.
They rid up an' knocked at the door.
An' her father says who's at the door?
Hit's your daughter, didn't you send for her,
An' mention said such a mass endure? [1]
Her father jumped up all out of the bed,
To think his daughter had rode with the dead,
He wrung his hands, he wept a-sore,
Her mother dear she wept much more.
Next mornin' so early to the grave they went,
To give this dangal [2] some content;
The handkerchief was round his head,
An' he had been a four months dead.
Now it is a warnin' to old folks,
They won't let young-uns have their will,
The first they love they'll never forget,
They'll still stand to it they love 'em yet.
Footnotes:
1. messenger? sent such a messenger?
2. damsel?