Our Goodman(When I Got Home)- Lambe (ON) 1963 Fowke
[The title was likely supplied by Fowke. From: Bawdy Ballads from Ontario. Fowke comments: That ballad has followed the same pattern for at least two centuries, for one of the Child texts comes from Herd's manuscript of 1776.
R. Matteson 2013]
A SAMPLING OF BAWDY BALLADS FROM ONTARIO
Edith Fowke
Gershon Legman states: "Sexual folklore is, with the lore of children, the only form of folklore still in uncontaminated and authentic folk transmission in the Western world"1 and, more specifically: "The bawdy song is surely the only remaining kind of song in English that can seriously be called 'folk' " (p. 426). Some may feel that he overstates his case, but few will deny that most types of traditional folk song are fast disappearing, while bawdry continues to flourish like a green bay tree. Mr. Legman goes on to describe how collectors have suppressed, expurgated, or revised bawdy songs. The resulting lack of reliable texts from oral tradition has prompted this sampling from Ontario.
Although I have made no particular effort to find bawdy songs, I have taped a number in the course of my general collecting. The most interesting came from four singers, and as these four are of varying ages and backgrounds, their songs are surprisingly representative of the different types of bawdy ballads. They also illustrate the two main categories Mr. Legman describes as "the erotic folksongs of the soil, and those of industrial cities, army barracks, and other unnatural human displacements" (p. 366).
The fourth singer, Woody Lambe, was a student at the Ontario Agricultural College at Guelph when I met him in May, 1963. A friend had told me that he knew many unusual folk songs, but when he came over one evening I found that he had learned most of them from records. The only songs he had learned from oral tradition were the bawdy ballads he heard at rugger parties, so we recorded his stock of these, ranging from such widespread ditties as "The Ball of Kirriemuir" and "Roll Me Over in the Clover" to obscene parodies of several well known songs.
Most of his songs are fairly modern, but he knows good versions of two of the oldest bawdy ballads: "Our Goodman" and "Mr. Fisherman." "Our Goodman" is, of course, very widely sung in more or less bawdy forms, and Woody's version follows the common "Four Nights Drunk" pattern. The "H.M.S." in the first stanza indicates an English origin, in contrast to the American "John B. Stetson," and the "zipper in a dishrag" must have been added since the 1920's when zippers were invented.
Our Goodman (When I Got Home) - Sung by Woody Lambe; Ontario Agricultural College at Guelph. Collected by Edith Fowke, 1963.
When I got home the other night my loving wife to see,
I spied a hat upon the rack where my hat ought to be,
So I said to my wife, the light of my life: "Explain this thing to me.
Whose is that hat upon the rack where my hat ought to be?"
She said: "You're drunk, you skunk, you silly old skunk, you're drunk as a skunk can be.
'Tis only a saucepan my neighbor left with me."
Now in all of my years of travelling, a million miles or more,
An H.M.S. on a saucepan I never have seen before.
When I got home the other night my loving wife to see,
I spied some pants upon the rack where my pants ought to be.
So I said to my wife, the light of my life: "Explain this thing to me.
Whose are those pants upon the rack where my pants ought to be?"
She said: "You're drunk, you skunk, you silly old skunk, you're drunk as a skunk can be.
'Tis only a dishrag my neighbor left with me."
Now in all of my years of travelling, a million miles or more,
A zipper in a dishrag I never have seen before.
When I got home the other night my loving wife to see,
I spied a head upon the bed where my head ought to be.
So I said to my wife, the light of my life: "Explain this thing to me.
Whose head is that upon the bed where my head ought to be?"
She said: "You're drunk, you skunk, you silly old skunk, you're drunk as a skunk can be.
'Tis only a baby my neighbor left with me."
Now in all of my years of travelling, a million miles or more,
A mustache on a baby I never have seen before.
When I got home the other night my loving wife to see
I spied a knob upon the job where my knob ought to be
So I said to my wife, the light of my life: "Explain this thing to me,
Whose is that knob upon the job where my knob ought to be?"
She said: "You're drunk, you skunk, you silly old skunk you're drunk as a skunk can be.
'Tis only a rolling pin my neighbor left with me."
Now in all of my years of travelling, a million miles or more
A foreskin on a rolling pin I never have seen before.