US & Canada Versions: 90. Jellon Grame
[The only version purported to be a US version of Jellon Grame was supplied by the Smith Brothers (R.E. Lee Smith and Thomas P. Smith), who I believe have re-written Child ballads (in this case, Child A, see Smiths' version of Twa Sisters for an account) and submitted these revisions to Kyle Davis Jr. in manuscript form, claiming to have sung them. The Smith's 1932 version of "Jellon Grame" was published in Davis's 1960 book, More Traditional Ballads of Virginia. The likeliness that this is authentic is slim.
Thomas P. Smith was a collector around 1914 for the Brown Collection of NC Folklore. His contributions to The Brown Collection, for the most part, appear to be legitimate. Obviously he knows the ballads and has access to the published Child versions. However, because of his later contributions (and/or those of his brother R. E. Lee Smith) to Davis when he moved to Virginia, all his contributions should be considered suspect. The Smiths join Woofter, Gainer and Niles as Americas great ballad re-creators. Some of the Smiths ballad recreations include "Percy" a version of Edward, "The Fair Sisters" a version of The Twa Sisters, "Three Sisters" a version of Babylon and "King Orfeo" once thought by Davis to be a version of Child 19. The ballads, that may seem to be obvious recreations to me, were somehow accepted by Kyle Davis Jr., whose stalwart career is now tarnished by the inclusion of the Smiths' ballads. This seems to me to be a case of the eager collector wanting to pad his portfolio. Davis for his part did not print every ballad given to him by the Smiths, but any of them were too many. Perhaps Davis's greatest fault is not investigating the submissions - since the Smiths claimed to sing them- and finding out if they knew them.
The text and Davis' notes are reprinted in full below from More Traditional Ballads of Virginia, 1960. In 1957 the Southern Folklore Quarterly: Volumes 21-22 by Alton Chester Morris, University of Florida, Southeastern Folklore Society published the text with this note:
The present text is the text of "Jellon Grame" listed in Reed Smith's census of ballad survivals in the Southern Folklore "Coffin refers only to Reed Smith's list in SFQ, I (June 1937), 9-11, and to Davis, Folk-Songs of Virginia both being listings of the present text. No texts published subsequently to Coffin have been found.
In 1958 Arthur Kyle Davis, Jr., and Paul Clayton Worthington published "Another New Traditional Ballad from Virginia: 'Jellon Grame' (Child, No. 90)" in SFQ, XXII with detailed notes.
R. Matteson 2015]
CONTENTS:
Jellon Grame- Yarber (NC) c1864 Smiths/Davis
__________________________________________
JELLON GRAME
(Child, No. 90)
"Jellon Grame" is one of the rarest ballads of the Virginia collection. Since the publication of Child's volumes, only two texts of this ballad have appeared from traditional sources: a three-stanza fragment from Scotland, and the present almost complete text from Virginia, penultimately from North Carolina.
The essentials of the story of the ballad are that a woman big with child is murdered by a man, either her favored or her rejected lover, who raises the child, a boy; when the boy grows up and learns of the murder of his mother, he avenges her death by killing the murderer.
The ballad is one of only two in Child's collection dealing with patricide, although this specific form of murder has been clearly retained in only one version (A). The other instance is the B version of "Edward" (Child, No. 13). For a discussion of domestic tragedy in ballads, see Gerould, The Ballad, of Tradition, pp. 49 fr.
Child prints five versions of this ballad, four in volume II and a fifth in Additions and Corrections in Volume V. Although the ballad first appeared in Scott's Minstrelsy in 1802, Scott undertook characteristically some "conjectural emendations" and apparently added four stanzas before the last two. Child therefore rejects Scott's version in favor of Mrs. Brown's manuscript copy as his A text, but with characteristic thoroughness lists in his notes all of Scott's emendations and additions. Since the story varies considerably in the several versions, we may briefly distinguish the five Child texts before examining the two more recent ones.
Child A, with twenty-two stanzas, is from Fraser Tytler's "Brown Manuscript." Jellon Grame sends a page to bring his love, Lillie Flower, to the Silver Wood. The page warns her that she may never return home, but she goes, nevertheless. Jellon accosts her, and she pleads for her life. She is carrying his child, and to see it weltering in her blood would be a piteous sight. Jellon replies that her father would hang him should he spare her life until their child is born. Although she offers to stay in the woods and raise the child there, Jellon slays her but takes pity on the surviving child, a "bonny boy" who is unnamed, and raises him, calling him his sister's son. One day as they ride through Silver Wood, the boy asks him why his brother never takes him home. Jellon points out the place beneath a nearby oak where he had murdered the boy's mother. Upon learning of this deed, the youth bends his bow and shoots an arrow through his father.
Child B, also twenty-two stanzas, from Motherwell's manuscript, tells a slightly different story. May Margerie. learns that she must go to the green-wood and make her love a shirt. She is surprised. because not a month of the year has gone by that she had not made him three. Her mother warns her that someone seeks her life, but May Margerie leaves. In the green-wood Hind Henry accosts and kills her, because she loves Brown Robin rather than himself. The boy who led May Margerie's horse returns to her home, and her sister runs to the wood, secures the new-born babe, and raises him, calling the child Brown Robin. One day, as he is playing in the green-wood after school, he meets Hind Henry, and asks him if he knows why all the wood is growing grass with the exception of one spot. Hind Henry explains that that is the very spot where he killed the boy's mother. Brown Robin seizes Hind Henry's sword and kills him.
Child C, with forty stanzas, is from Buchan's Ballads of the North of Scotland. It relates nearly the same incidents as Child B, diluted and vulgarized, in almost twice as many verses (II, 302). The unfortunate lady is May-a-Roe, and her murderer, Hind Henry; Brown Robin is Hind Henry's brother. The sister makes no appearance, and, as in Child A, the murderer raises the boy, but names him Robin Hood. On hearing how his mother met her death, the boy kills Hind Henry with an arrow.
Child D is a fragment of five stanzas from Cromek's Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song. The lady is Lady Margerie, as in Child B, and the murderer is simply Henry. Child's fifth text in Volume V is from the papers of Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe. It has twenty-two stanzas and it a close variant of Child B, but the lady's name is May Young Ro, and the boy's own dagger is used instead of the murderer's sword.
The ballad seems to preserve some ancient mythology. Child writes (II, 303):
It is interesting to find an ancient and original trait preserved even in so extremely corrupted a version as C of the present ballad, a circumstance very far from unexampled. In stanza 18 we read that the child who is to avenge his mother "grew as big in ae year auld as some boys would in three," and we have a faint trace of the same extraordinary thriving in B 15: "Of all the youths was at that school none could with him compare." So in one of the Scandinavian ballads akin to 'Fause Food-rage,' and more remotely to 'Jellon Grame,' the corresponding child grows more in two months than other boys in eight years.
Other examples of precocious growth can be found in various literatures; for example, in the French romance of Alexander, and in Gargantua and Pantagruel. "Jellon Grame" resembles "Child Maurice" ( Child, No. 83 ) in its beginning, and Wimberly finds a trace of the enchanted forest myth in the Silver Wood which appears in both:
Bearing . . . in mind the generally sacred character of the birch, we may venture to see an Otherworld forest in the Silver Wood of Child Maurice (83 A 1, G 1) and Jellon Grome (90 A I; 5, 6, 17; D 5), for there is a hint of myth in it.
Other touches of folklore may perhaps be seen in the implied close relationship of a "sister's son" or in the poetic suggestion of a blood-omen in "The red run's i the rain" or "The blood runs cold as rain."
As Child remarks, "Jellon Grame" may be considered a counterpart of "Fause Foodrage" (Child, No. 89). In all versions of "Jellon Grame," except A, the woman has two lovers. The one who is preferred is killed by the other in "Fause F'oodrage," while in "Jellon Grame" the woman herself is killed by the lover she has rejected; in both ballads the woman's son takes vengeance on the murderer before he (the son) reaches manhood. Since the publication of Child's texts, as was stated above, only two texts of this ballad seem to have been recovered: one Scottish fragment, and the present excellent Virginia text. The Scottish text, with its tune, was published in Greig's Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads and, Balla'd Airs, 1925, pp. 70-71. The text is a somewhat confused fragment, which is related to Child A. Greig's stanzas 1 and 2 are comparable to Child A 1 and 2, Greig's third stanza to Child A 9. Greig's tune is especially valuable, since, although the Virginia version was apparently sung, its tune was not recorded. Child mentions no tunes to "Jellon Grame" in manuscript or published collections; thus it appears that Greig's tune, contributed earlier to the Miscellanea of the Rymour Club, has, as the editor Alexander Keith states, the "interest of being, apparently, the only air yet noted for the ballad" (p. 21). He describes it as "in typical old ballad style, Aeolian and pentatonic." In North America no texts seem to have been recovered, except that found in Virginia. The present text is the text of "Jellon Grame" listed in Reed Smith's census of ballad survivals in the Southern Folklore Quarterly for 1937, and in Coffin's bibliographical survey.
The Virginia text was contributed to the Virginia Folklore Society by R. E. Lee Smith, January 20, 1932, as it was sung by his brother, Thomas P. Smith, and himself. They learned it from M. A. Yarber, of Mast, North Carolina, January 16, 1914. A note on the manuscript by Mr. Smith reads: "M. A. Yarber heared it sang by his father John Yarber now it be 60 or more years ago. The Cox women also sang this song at least 50 years ago." Mr. Smith's text has twenty stanzas (of which two lack one line each), and like Greig's fragment it is related to Child A. It follows the story closely, but differs greatly in wording, as does the Greig fragment. Often the Virginia text and the Greig text both vary from Child A, and from each other.
For a detailed illustration of these verbal differences, see the article by Arthur Kyle Davis, Jr., and Paul Clayton Worthington, "Another New Traditional Ballad from Virginia: 'Jellon Grame' (Child, No. 90)," SFQ, XXII (December, 1958), 163-72, where this text was first printed with a detailed commentary. The Virginia text has lost all Scottish dialect and unusual words and is spoken in the natural language of rural Virginia or North Carolina. Instead of "His errand for to gang" of Child A, the Virginia, text has "his errand for to go"; instead of " 'Win up, my bonny boy,' he says," it has " 'hurry up, my little boy,' he said"; instead of "She lighted off her milk-white steed," the Virginia text has "jumped off"; instead of "Though I should never win hame," it has "If I never come back again"; instead of "As a hunting they did gay," it has "As they was hunting game"; and so on. Virginia's name for the unhappy lady, Rosy Flower, varies poetically the Lillie Flower of Child A and the May-a-Roe of Child C or the May Young Ro of Child's fifth version, Volume V.
Except for the numerous verbal differences, the Virginia text corresponds closely to Child A with the omission of Child A, stanzas 10 and 15, presenting an interesting sidelight on the oral "editing" of ballads. Child A 10 reads:
10 'Your bairn, that stirs between my sides,
Maun shortly see the light;
But to see it weltring in my blude
Would be a piteous sight.'
This stanza is the one needed to indicate clearly that the babe is Jellon Grame's. Although the Virginia text strongly implies such a relationship, the fact is not openly stated: perhaps an unconscious folk excision of a detail which makes the tragic action in the ballad even more repugnant; it is a situation the folk have not cared to sing of. The second stanza not found in the Virginia text reads (Child A 15):
15 Up has he taen that bonny boy,
Gien him to nurices nine,
Three to wake, and three to sleep,
And three to go between.
It adds little to the story, which is continued, "And he's brought up that bonny boy," and even presents a slightly discordant picture of Jellon Grame as somewhat more civilized than the half-wild creature of the forest, such as the rest of the ballad suggests. The idea of nine nurses for a single babe would hardly commend itself or be credible to the American folk.
To sum up, the present text, though without tune, is among Virginia's rarer contributions to American folk-song. It is the only non-fragmentary text of "Jellon Grame" recovered from oral tradition since Child's publication, and the only version of this ballad to be found in North America. It is a fine text, and its "imperfections" seem only to vindicate its authenticity. What a pity it lacks a tune! But it is wiser to be grateful for the salvage of a unique text.
AA. "Jellon Grame." collected by R.E. Lee smith, of Palmyra, Va. Sung by his brother, Thomas P. Smith, of Palmyra, Va., and himself. Fluvanna County. January 20, 1932. Notes on the manuscript by Mr. Smith state: "Sang by M. A. Yarber, Mast, N. C., Jan. 6, 1914. M. A. yarber heard it sang by his father, John Yarber, now it be 60 or more years ago. The Cox women also sang this song at least 50 years ago." A few line divisions are uncertain in the manuscript.
1 Jellon Grame was in the Greenwoods
And he whistled and sang,
And he called his little servant boy
His errand for to go.
2 "Hurry up, my little boy," he said,
"As quick as you ever can,
For you must go for the Rosy Flower
Before the break of day."
3 The boy buckled his belt on,
And through the woods he run,
Until he come to the lady's door
Before the day dawned.
4 "Are you awake, Rosy Flower?
The blood runs cold as rain."
"I am awake," said she,
"Who's that that calls my name?"
5 "You are called to come to Greenwood
To meet Jellon Grame,
And I fear it will be the last time
You will meet Jellon Grame."
6 "I'll go to the Greenwood
If I never come back again,
For the man I most desire to see
On earth is Jellon Grame."
7 She had not rode over three miles
. . . . .
When she came to a new-made grave
Beneath a large oak tree.
8 And up walked Jellon Grame
Out of the woods close by,
"Light down, light down, my Rosy Flower,
For here is where you must die."
9 She jumped off her milk-white steed
And pled upon her knee,
"Oh, please have mercy, Jellon Grame,
For I am not prepared to die."
10 "If I should spare your life," he said,
"Until your child be borned,
I know your cruel father would
Have me hanged by morn."
11 "Oh, spare my life, dear Jellon,
My father you need not dread,
I will keep my child in the Greenwood
And go and beg my bread."
12 He had no mercy on the fair lady,
Though she for her life did pray;
He stopped[1] her through the heart,
And at his feet did lay.
13 He had no mercy for that lady,
Although she was lying dead,
But he had for the little child
That was weltering in her blood.
14 And he raised up that little child
And he called him his sister's son;
He thought no one could ever find
The cruel deed he had done.
15 But it fell one summertime
As they was hunting game,
They stopped to rest in Greenwoods
Upon a pleasant day.
16 Then out spoke the little boy
With tears in his eyes,
"Please tell me the truth, Jellon Grame,
And do not tell me a lie.
17 "What is the reason my mammy dear
Does never take me home?
To keep me in the woods all the time
Is a cruel shame."
18 "I killed your mother dear
. . . . .
And she lies buried beneath
Yonder green oak tree."
19 The boy drew his bow,
It was made very strong,
And he pierced an arrow
Through Jellon Grame's heart.
20 "Now lay there, Jellon Grame,
You cruel murderous beast;
The place my dear mammy lays buried
Is too good for thee."
1. for stobbed