Young Collins- Combs (WV) c.1909 Cox A
[From: Folk-Songs of the South- John Harrington Cox, 1925. His notes follow. This is one of three versions of Young Collins/Johnny Collins collected by Cox (A,B, and E). This is not related to a different ballad titled, "Young Collins."
R. Matteson 2012, 2015]
17. LADY ALICE (Child, No. 85)
Five variants have been recovered in West Virginia, under various titles. A, B, and E represent one version, C and D another. They all differ widely from the Child versions.
A Pennsylvania version going back almost to 1800 was printed by Child, No. 279. For other American texts see Journal, xxviii, 151 (Perrow; North Carolina); Focus, m, 154, and iv, 50 (Virginia); Campbell and Sharp, No. 22 (North Carolina, Tennessee); Campbell, The Survey, New York, January 2, 1915, XXXIII, 373 (two stanzas from Georgia). For other American references see Journal, xxx, 317. Add Bulletin, Nos. 6-10.
A. "Young Collins." Contributed by Mr. J. Harrison Miller, Wardensville, Hardy County, January, 1917; learned from Mr. Lemuel C. Combs about eight years previously; a community song known to various people. Printed by Cox, xlvi, 124.
1 Young Collins rode out from his fields one day,
While the flowers and trees were in bloom,
And it was there that he saw his own Fair Ellen,
A- washing a white marble stone.
2 She screamed, she cried, she changed her mind,
She waved her lily-white hand,
Saying, "Come here, come here, Young Collins, my dear,
Your life is near at hand."
3 He clasped around her slender waist,
He kissed both her cheeks and her chin,
Till the stars from heaven came twinkling down,
To the spot where Young Collins jumped [in].
4 He ran, he ran to his own father's house,
Till he came to his own father's door,
Saying, " Father, dear father, I pray let me in,
I pray let me in once more.
5 "If I should die this very night,
Which I feel in my mind that I will,
Go bury me under the white marble stone,
At the foot of Fair Ellen's green hill."
6 As Ellen was sitting in her own cottage door,
All dressed up in silk so fine,
It was there that she spied a casket coming,
As far as her eyes could shine.
7 "Whose casket, whose casket, whose casket I see?
Who lies in that casket so fine?"
" 'T is Young Johnny Collins, a cold clay corpse,
Who lies in that casket so fine."
8 She ordered the casket to be opened right there,
Till she gazed on his cold clay form,
Till she took the last kiss from his cold clay lips,
As oft they had kissed her before.
9 She ordered the curtains to be brought right there,
Till she trimmed them in lace so fine:
"To-day they will weep over Collins' grave;
To-morrow they shall weep over mine."
10 The news went round through Dublin Town,
It was printed on Dublin gate,
That six pretty maidens on Saturday's night
All died for Young Collins' fate.