From George Benstead
Collected by Cecil Sharp, Hamstreet, 22nd September 1908.
Cecil Sharp MSS, Folk Tunes CJS2/10/1920
The Thresherman and the Squire
From Clarke Lonkhurst
Collected by Cecil Sharp, Hamstreet, 23rd September 1908.
Cecil Sharp MSS, Folk Words CJS2/9/1774, Folk Tunes CJS2/10/1921
A similar version of the song – although in 4/4 rather than 6/8 – was noted by Francis Collinson from Clark Lonkhurst’s cousin Harry Barling. See The Thresher Man.
Green Bushes
From Mrs Matilda Jenner
Collected by Anne Gilchrist, Ashurst, June 1906
Anne Gilchrist MSS Collection AGG/3/6/1c, AGG/8/31; Journal of the Folk-Song Society 5
(1915) pp.177-180
The Banks of Sweet Primroses
From Mrs Matilda Jenner
Collected by Anne Gilchrist, 1905 (?)
Anne Gilchrist MSS Collection AGG/3/6/9b
Babes in the Wood
From Mrs Matilda Jenner
Collected by Anne Gilchrist, Ashurst, 1905 (?)
Anne Gilchrist MSS Collection AGG/3/6/9c
The following words are given in The Nursery Rhymes of England, collected by James Orchard Halliwell (1886)
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32415/32415-h/32415-h.htm
- My dear, do you know,
How a long time ago,
Two poor little children,
Whose names I don’t know,
Were stolen away on a fine summer’s day,
And left in a wood, as I’ve heard people say. - And when it was night,
So sad was their plight,
The sun it went down,
And the moon gave no light!
They sobb’d and they sigh’d, and they bitterly cried,
And the poor little things, they lay down and died. - And when they were dead,
The Robins so red
Brought strawberry leaves,
And over them spread;
And all the day long,
They sung them this song,
“Poor babes in the wood! poor babes in the wood!
And don’t you remember the babes in the wood?”