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Brewster: Ballads and Songs of Indiana
4. "0 yes, I'm sick and very sick;
I feel my cold corpse coming,
But one sweet kiss from your sweet lips
Would keep me from a-dying."
5. "0 mind you not, young man," said she,
"As you sat in the tavern, You pledged the health of ladies all around, But you slighted Barbara Allen ?"*
6. Slowly, slowly she rose up,
And slowly, too, she left him, And, sighing, said she could not stay Since breath of life had left him.5 |
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7. "Little Willie Green died for me last night;
I'll die for him tomorrow; I do not care to live any more
In this cold world of sorrow."6
8. They buried him by the church steeple high,
And buried her beside him; And out of his grave there grew a red rose And out of hers grew a briar.7
9. They grew and grew to the top of the spire
Until they could grow no higher; They turned and tied in a truelover's knot, The red rose and green briar.
4 This seems to be more closely related to Child A than to any other of the Cf. Child A, 5:
*'0 dinna ye mind, young man," said she,
"When ye was in the tavern a drinking, That ye made the healths gae round and round* And slighted Barbara Allen?"
5 For Since death of life had reft him. Cf. Child A, 7:
And slowly, slowly raise she up, And slowly, slowly left him, And sighing said, she could not stay. Since death of life had reft him. •The last two lines of this stanza sound suspiciously modern. T There has been a transposition here, with a resulting kw» of rhyme. |
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