Lord Loving- From the singing of Mrs. Samuel Harmon, Cade's Cove, Blount County, Tennessee 1929
[From the article: Ballads and Songs of the Southern Highlands by Mellinger E. Henry; The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 42, No. 165 (Jul. - Sep., 1929), pp. 254-300. This is also in Henry's book, Folk-Songs from the Southern Appalachians with music (see below). The music features a remarkable leap of more than an octave- on the second beat of the first measure. The last moralizing line is similar to the version titled Lord Robert by Minnie Payne of Newfoundland in 1930. Apparently the name "Lord Loving" is taken from "Lord Lovel" or even a cross again with "Loving Henry."
As I recall this is an extension of the same Harmon family that originally settled in Watauga Co., NC (Council Harmon). See Hicks/Harmon Families.
R. Matteson 2011]
2. EARL, BRAND Child, No. 7
"Lord Loving." From the singing of Mrs. Samuel Harmon, Cade's Cove, Blount County, Tennessee, who learned it from Grandfather Harmon in Watauga County, North Carolina. Recorded by Mrs. Mellinger E. Henry. See Campbell and Sharp, No. 3, four variants; Cox, No. 2; Perrow, Journal XXVIII, 152; Reed Smith, Journal XXVIII, 200; Mackenzie, The Quest of the Ballad, 60.
1. "Hold my horse, little Marget," he said,
"Hold him with your hand,
Till I go and fight your seven brothers bold
In the meadow where they stand."
2. She stood and she stood
And she never shed a tear,
Till she seed her seven brothers bold fall
And her father who loved her so dear.
3. She pulled her handkerchief out of her pocket -
Was of the Holland so fine -
She tuk and wiped her brothers' bloody wounds
Until the blood run as red as the wine.
4. "Choose you now, little Marget," he says,
"Go long with me abide."
"I must go, Lord Loving," she said,
"Lord, you've left me nary a guide."
5. He mounted himself on a Turkish brown,
And she on the dapple grey;
And he blowed his bugle both loud and shrill,
And he bled as he rode away.
6. He rode by the light of the bright shining moon
Till he come to his mother's barried (barred) door:
"Open the door, dear mother," he says,
"Little Marget, she is won."
7. "Make me a bed, dear mother," he says,
"Make it wide and deep,
Lay little Marget in my arms
That the sounder I may sleep."
8. Lord Loving died before midnight
And she along 'fore day;
And if that be the way of all such true lovers,
Who run away together,
God send them more pleasure than they.