ABSTRACT
It is only during the last half-century that unbowdlerised versions of this beautiful song have begun to appear in print. When Dean Christie’s book was published in i 881, it contained a tune to the song with the rider: ‘The editor in his young days has often heard this last strain sung to “ There Were Two Pretty Maidens a-W ooing as They Went” which is altogether unsuitable for this w ork.’ Kidson, who published a solitary stanza in 18 9 1, was equally disapproving: ‘ It could be wished that the succeeding verses to the first (the only one which I have printed) were equally m eritorious and more suitable for this w ork.’ Baring-G ould, also, appears to have been shocked by the song, so much so that he had the text re-written for the first edition o f Songs of the West. For the second edition he was content to present ‘a modified text’ . Cecil Sharp collected a version in Oxfordshire in 1923 (the last song he collected), but followed Kidson’s example by publishing only one stanza. It was not until 1958 that a complete and unmodified traditional text appeared when Reeves published the BaringGould/W illiam Stokes version.
