Six Pretty Maids- Husted (MO) 1911 Belden E
[My title. From Ballads and Songs; Collected by the Missouri Folk-Lore Society; Belden 1940.
R. Matteson 2014]
E. [Six Pretty Maids] No title. Another version given to Miss Hamilton by Agnes Shibley, 1911, as learned from her grandmother, Mrs. S. E. Husted, Putnam County.
'Go fetch me some of your mother's gold
And some of your father's fee,
And two of the best horses of yonder stable
Where there stood, thirty and three.'
She brought him some of her mother's gold
And some of her father's fee
And two of the best horses out of yonder stable
Where there stood thirty and three.
She mounted on the milk-white steed,
And him on the dapple gray.
They rode and they rode until they came to the seaside
Three long hours before day.
'Light off, light off that milk-white steed
And deliver it unto me;
For six pretty maids I have drowned here
And the seventh you shall be.'
'Pull off, pull off those silken clothes
And deliver them unto me;
For methinks they look too gay
To rot in the salt, salt sea.'
'Oh, turn Your back around to me,
For I don't think that it is fit
For such a man as thee
An undressed woman to see.'
She gathered him 'round the waist so small
And pushed him in the sea.
She mounted on the milk-white steed
And led the dapple gray.
She rode and she rode
. . . . .
Until she came to her father's house
One long hour before day.
The parrot was in the window,
And unto her did say:
'My pretty maiden, my pretty maiden,
Why do you travel so long before day?'
'Hush up, hush up, my pretty parrot,
Don't tell no tales on me;
Your cage shall be made of the glittering gold
And hang on a greenwood tree.'
A year later Miss Shibley added the following lines as -'known by her mother when a girl' presumably belong where in E is only the truncated form of the story in stanza 7. The 'druped high,' 'druped low' seems to be a memory of what appears in Such's print as
He groped high, and he groped low
and in Pitts's as
He dropped high and he dropped low
She catched him around the waist so small
And tumbled him into the sea.
He druped high, he druped low,
Until he came to the shore.
'Take hold of my hand, my pretty Polly,
And I'll make you my bride.'
'Lie there, lie there, you false-hearted man,
Lie there in the place of me;
For six pretty maids you've drowned here,
And the seventh I've drowned thee.'