The Demon Lover (Child 243) The earliest known text of this ballad is a broadside attributed to James Price, dated 1657 and bearing the snappy little title: ‘A warning for married Women. By the example of Mrs. Jane Renalds, a West-Country Woman, born neer unto Plymouth; who having plighted her troth to a Sea-man, was afterwards Married to a Carpenter, and at last carried away by a Spirit’. This runs to an equally long-winded 32 verses, the first seventeen of which appear in none of the later versions presented by Child, and in which the sinister conclusion more recently associated with the ballad is replaced by banal grieving and moralising. So was the horror-movie stuff added later, or did Price bowdlerize an earlier, darker tale? My verses are cherry-picked from Child. The earlier ones are found in most of his eight (largely Scots) versions and are also common in the Appalachian descendent The Housecarpenter, but the final fate of the ship is variable, its demolition by the demon occurring in only one of Child’s texts (F). The cloven foot is sighted in two (E & F), but I’ve been unable to find a traditional source for the “tall and taller” verse and suspect it may have been added much later by A. L. Lloyd. Nice verse, though. No contest for a tune: Robert and Henry Hammond noted a version from
Marina Russell of Upwey, Dorset, in 1907. Mrs. Russell had only three
verses, essentially 1, 5 and 6 here, but hers is the most dramatic melody
you could wish for to accompany such a horrific tale. |
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1. Well
met, well met my own true love I’ve been away these seven years and more I’ve come to claim those former vows You promised me so long before |
2. I
might have had a king’s daughter And fain she would have married me But I gave up that crown of gold ‘Twas all for the sake my love of thee |
3. If
you might have had a king’s daughter You’ve none but yourself to blame For I am married to a ship’s carpenter And to him I have a bonny young son |
4.
But if I was to leave my husband dear And my little babe also Oh what would you have to keep me with If along with you I should go |
5.
I have three ships all on the sea One of them has brought me safe to land I’ve four and twenty mariners on board You shall have music at your command |
6.
And the ship, my love you shall sail in Is glorious to behold The sails are of the finest silk And the masts are of the beaten gold |
7. So
it’s you must leave your husband dear And sail away with me I’ll take you where the white lilies grow All on the banks of Italy |
8. And
as she went walking up the street Most beautiful to behold He cast a glamour all o’er her face And she shone like brightest gold |
9.
When she set her foot on board the ship No mariners could she behold But the sails were of the finest silk And the masts were of the beaten gold |
10. Now
they hadn’t been a-sailing a mile, a mile A mile but barely one When she began to weep and mourn And think upon her bonny young son |
| 11. Now
they hadn’t been a-sailing a mile, a mile A mile but barely two Before she spied his cloven foot From his bright robes sticking through |
12. Now
they hadn’t been a-sailing a mile, a mile A mile but barely three When dark and eerie grew his face And raging grew the sea |
13.
Oh will you see the white lilies grow All on the banks of Italy Or will you see the fishes swim All on the bottom of the sea |
14.
And as she turned herself round about So tall, and taller then grew he Until the tops of that gallant ship No taller were than he |
| 15.
And he struck the top-mast with his hand |
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