From George O Howell (ed.), The Kentish Note Book Vol. 2, 1894, pp16-18.
Reprinted from Gravesend and Dartford Reporter, 7th February 1891.
Contributed by H.W. Smith, Belvedere, Kent.
These verses appeared under the heading “Old Kentish Ballad”.
The following is an old Kentish Ballad which has “been handed down from father to son,” for a period extending over 150 years, though there is very little doubt that the “Ballad” is older than that.
At the beginning of the present century it was frequently to be heard at “Harvest Homes,” &c , and again at “social re-unions” of Farmers or “rustics” on such occasions as Gravesend or Farningham Cattle Fairs. In the case of the Fairs the singer would sometimes vary the third line in the first verse, commencing “All over our part,” by substituting “In Gravesend our town” (or “in Farningham town”) “it warn’t much of a mystery,” &c.
I do not know that the Ballad has ever appeared in print but as an old “Romance of Rustic Life” it may possibly be worth preserving in the Kentish Note Book
Following the text:
There is another verse, but the allusions are of so pointed a nature that they cannot very well be printed verbatim.
Suffice it to say that, from a point of view adopted by the rustic mind, for her treatment of Master Richard retribution overtakes Mistress Nelly in the form of a ” trouble ” which necessitates that even “friends and relations look on with a frown.” Moreover, Master Jack Bell, the grave-digger, deserts her, and in time she is left with a duplicate of that individual on a reduced scale, with a birth mark of a hay-band around his unfortunate neck and, —” he isn’t much seen by the folk of the town.”
Tol-de-rol, &c., &c.
I may add that the tune as it was sung to me was very much of the nature of an adaptation of the tune of “Sir Roger-de-Coverley.” The effect of the Tol-de-rol, &c., sung by a chorus of rustics is more easily imagined than described.
Belvedere H. W. SMITH.
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