Three Little Babes- Dryden (TX-TN) c1901 Owens
[From Owens; Texas Folk Songs, 1950. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2015]
THE THREE LITTLE BABES
Sir Waiter Scott, in his Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, called this song "The Wife of Usher's Well." I heard it first in Texas when Mrs. Ben Dryden of the Sandy Creek settlement near Fred sang it for me in June, 1941. After that I heard it several times, always in the vicinity of the Big Thicket. Mrs. Dryden, who had lived more than fifty years in Sandy Creek, learned the song when she was a child from people who came from the Tennessee mountains. After she had recorded the song for me, I asked her to sing "The Wife of Usher's Well." "I ain't never heard of that song," she replied. This song, apparently of Scottish origin, was popular in Scotland and England and has been widely reported in the United States. The version printed here is
somewhat garbled. The story in general is of a mother who sent her three sons away to learn their Bible Book. While they were away they all were drowned. The mother, in her great grief, begged them to return to her. They did come at night. She set the table for them with bread and wine, but they had to refuse her because the Savior had divine food for them. They also refused to lie in the bed she had made for them, though she spread it with a "golden wand."
Then when the dawn came, they had to go away. An English version explains their reason for going more effectively:
The cock doth craw, the day doth daw,
The channerin worm doth chide;
Gin we be mist our o our place,
A sair pain we maun abide.
In a version sung for me by Rod Drake of the Drake settlement near Silsbee the mother-
Sent her three little babes to the North Country
To learn their grammaree.
Grammaree is an old Scotch word meaning magic. That meaning has been lost to East Texans and they associate the word in some way with schoolbooks. In another version from the same area the babes are sent to North Carolina- another demonstration of how local place names creep into ballads.
Three Little Babes- Sung by Mrs. Ben Dryden, Fred, Texas, 194I.
Once there was a poor widow woman,
The mother of three little babes;
She sent her three little babes
To learn their Bible Book.
They had not gone but about three weeks,
I'm sure it was not four
Till there came a flood and washed her three little babes away
And she began to weep and mourn,
Saying, "Come to me, my three little babes,
Tonight or in the morning soon."
Her three little babes came wandering down
Into their mother's arms.
Saying, "We can't come to you, dear mother,
But you can come to us,
For yander stands our dear Savior
And to Him we must obey."
She fixed them a table
All with bread and wine,
Saying, "Come and eat and drink with me,
Come on, my three little babes."
Up riz up the oldest one,
Saying, "We cain't eat your bread, dear mother,
Nor neither drink your wine;
"For yander stands our dear Savior,
And to Him we must obey."
She fixed them a bed all in the back room,
She fixed it with all clean sheets.
And on the top she spread a golden wand
To make them all sleep warm;
And on the top she spread a golden wand
To make them all sleep warm.
Up riz up the oldest one,
Early in the morning soon,
Saying, "Yander stands our dear Savior,
And to Him we must obey."