| Share page | Visit Us On FB |
|
|
||
|
328 ENGLISH SONG AND BALLAD MUSIC. |
||
|
|
||
|
Another version of this ballad is printed in the Rev. Joseph Hunter's ■ History of Sheffield (p. 104), from " a small volume of old poetry in the Wilson Collections." It is there entitled, " Verses on account of King Charles the First raising money by Knighthood, 1630." Shepherds are said to wear ten-penny, instead of " two shilling," bonnets in that version; and it has the following concluding stanza :— " Now to conclude and shut up my sonnet,
Leave off the cart, whip, hedge-bill, and flail; This is my counsel, think well upon it,
Knighthood and honour are now put to sale. Then make haste quickly, and let out your farms, And take my advice in blazing your arms. Honour incites you" &c. The above would suit the tunc of Hunting the Hare.
NEW MAD TOM OF BEDLAM, oe MAD TOM.
The earliest printed copy hitherto discovered of ,the music of this celebrated song, which retains undiminished popularity after a lapse of more than two centuries, is to be found in the first edition of The English Dancing Master, 1650-51.. This is one of the earliest known publications by Playford, before whose time music was sparingly printed, and small pieces, such as songs, ballad and dance tunes, or lessons for the virginals, were chiefly to be bought in manuscript, as they "are in many parts of Italy at the present time. In the first edition of Tfie Dancing Master the tune is called Gray's-Inne Malice, and in later editions (for instance, the fourth, printed in 1670) Gray's-Inne MasJce; or, Mad Tom. The black-letter copies of the ballad, in the Pepys Collection (i. 502); in the Bagford (643, m. 9, p. 52); and the Roxburghe (i. 299), arc entitled New Mad Tom of Bedlam; or,— "The Man in the Moone drinks claret,"
With powder'd beef, turnip, and carret," &c.
" The tune is Gray's-Inn Maske."
It was formerly the custom of gentlemen of the Inns of Court to hold revels four times a year,* and to represent masks and plays in their own Halls, or else-
* The ballad is usually printed with another, which is also It makes an old man lusty,
entitled "The New Mad Tom; or, The Man in the Moon The young to brawl,
drinks Claret, as it was lately sung at the Curtain, Holy- And the drawers up call,
well, to the same tune." The Curtain Theatre (according Before being too much musty,
to Malone and Collier) was in disuse at the commence- Whether you drink all or little,
ment of the reign of Charles I. (1625). This ballad has Pot it so yourselves to wittle;
threelong verses, in the same measure, and evidently in- Then though twelve
tended to be sung to the same music. The first is as A clock it be,
follows :— Yet all the way g0 roarjng-
" Bacchus, the father of drunken nowls, If the band
Full mazers, beakers, glasses, bowls, Of bills cry stand,
Greezie flap-dragons, Flemish upsie freeze, Swear that you must a-----
With health stab'd in arms upon naked knees; Such gambols, such tricks, such fegaries,
Of all his wines he makes you tasters, We fetch though we touch no canaries ;
So you tipple like bumbasters; Drink wine till the welkin roars,
Drink till you reel, a welcome he doth give; And cry out a —— of your scores."
O how the boon claret makes you live; b Another curious custom, of obliging lawyers to dance
Not a painter purer colours shows four times a year, is quoted from Dugdale by Sir John
Then what's laid on by claret. Hawkins. (History of Music, vol. ii., p. 137.) "It is not
Pearl and ruby doth set out the nose, mmy years since the judges, in compliance with ancient
When thin small beer doth mar it; custom, danced annually on Candlemas-day. And, that
Rich mne is good, nothing might be wanting for their encouragement in this
It heats the blood, excellent study (the law), they have very anciently had |
||
|
|
||