The House Carpenter- Doyel (MO) 1917 Belden H (Barbour)
[From: Some Fusions in Missouri Ballads by Frances M. Barbour; The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 49, No. 193 (Jul. - Sep., 1936), pp. 207-214. Listed in Songs and Ballads, 1940 as version H.
R. Matteson 1913]
THE HOUSE CARPENTER- (Child 243, "James Harris" or "The Daemon Lover") sung by Miss Minnie Doyel, Arlington,
Phelps County, Missouri in 1917.
"I once could have married a king's daughter
And she would have married me,
But I have crossed the deep briny ocean
All for the love of thee."
"If you could have married a king's daughter
And she would have married thee,
You need not have crossed the deep briny ocean
All for the love of me.
"[If you could have married a king's daughter,
I think you are to blame] [1]
For I am married to a house carpenter,
And I think he's a fine young man."
"If you will leave your house carpenter
And come along with me,
I'll take you where the grass grows green
On the banks of Liberty."
She picked up her dear little babe
And gave it kisses three,
Saying, "Stay at home, my dear little babe,
Keep father company."
She went into her dressing room
And dressed all up so gay
Just for to leave her house carpenter
And sail on the raging sea.
"And what have you got to maintain me upon
And keep me from slavery?"
. . . .
. . . .
"I've seven ships in harbor and on sea
And seven more on land.
And three hundred of bright boatsmen
To rise at your command."
She picked up her dear little babe
And gave it kisses four,
Saying, "Stay at home my dear little babe
Whose face I shall see no more."
This lady had not been a-sailing on deck
For more than two weeks or three,
When she was down at the bottom of the boat,
Weeping most bitterly.
"O, do you weep for your silver or your gold,
Or do you weep for your store,
Or do you weep for your house carpenter
You left on the other shore?"
"I neither weep for my silver nor my gold,
I neither weep for my store,
But I do weep for my poor little babe
Whose face I shall see no more."
This lady had not been a-sailing on deck
For more than three weeks or four,
When there sprang a leak at the bottom of the boat;
Her weeping was heard no more.
Footnote: 1. Supplied from H. M. Belden, Journal of American Folk-lore, Vol. XIX, p. 297.
Two versions of this ballad from Tuscumbia, Missouri, contain an elaborate stanza descriptive of the lady's appearance. In one it is the following:
She dressed herself all neat and clean,
All dressed in living green,
And all the cities that she went through,
They took her to be some queen,
and in the other:
She dressed herself in scarlet red,
Her waist with maiden green,
And every city that she rode through,
They took her to be some queen.
These stanzas are an adaptation from "Lord Thomas and Fair Annet" (Child, B, stanza 20, and D, stanza II). This shift does not occur in any of the Child versions of "The Daemon Lover," and it is not a common one. The adaptation is apparently a clear case of a desire for embellishment and could hardly be accounted for by the very vague similarity of situation. Almost any occasion is an excuse for a woman to dress up, and your ballad singer, it seems, will dress her up with no excuse at all.