Three Little Babes- Shelton (NC) 1916 Sharp A
[My title, replacing the generic child title. From Cecil Sharp; English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians; Sharp/Campbell I, 1917; also Sharp/Karpeles I; 1932. The 1932 Edition notes follow.
R. Matteson 2015]
No. 22. The Wife of Usher's Well.
Texts without tunes:—Child's English and Scottish Popular Ballads, No. 79. Journal of American Folk-Lore, xiii. 119; xxiii. 429; xxx. 305; xxxix. 96. Cox's Folk Songs of the South, p. 88.
Texts with tunes:—E. M. Leather's Folk-Lore of Herefordshire, p. 198. Davis's Traditional Ballads of Virginia, pp. 278 and 576.
See also The Cruel Mother (No. 10), Tune B. McGill's Folk Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, p. 5. Texts A and B are remarkable in that the children cite the mother's 'proud heart' as the reason that has caused them to 'lie in the cold clay', a motive which is absent from other English and Scottish versions.
A. [Three Little Babes] Sung by Mr. SOL. and Miss VIRGINIA SHELTON at Alleghany, N. C, July 29, 1916
Pentatonic. Mode 2.
1. She hadn't been married but very short time
Until children she had three;
She sent them out to the north countree
To learn the grammaree.
2 They hadn't been there before a very short time,
Scarcely six weeks and three days,
Till sickness came into that old town
And swept her three babes away.
3 She dreamed a dream when the nights were long,
When the nights were long and cold;
She dreamed she saw her three little babes
Come walking down to their home.
4 She spread them a table all on a white cloth,
And on it she put bread and wines.
Come and eat, come and eat, my three little babes.
Come and eat and drink those wines.
5 Take it off, take it off, mother dear, cried they,
For we can no longer stay,
For yonder stands one, our Saviour dear,
To take us in his arms.
6 She spread them a bed in the backside room,
And on it she put three sheets,
And one of the three was a golden sheet,
For the youngest one might sleep.
7 Take it off, take it off, mother dear, cried they,
For we can no longer stay,
For yonder stands one, our Saviour dear,
To take us in his arms.
8 Dear mother, it is the fruits of your own pride heart
That has caused us to lie in the clay.
Cold clods at our head, green grass at our feet,
We are wrapped in our winding-sheets.