Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/182

 176

NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. i. FEB. 26,

As she was a very small girl when she was at school in France this may have been a bow^dlerized version of an older song. When she sang it, she did not repeat the last line.

JOHN B. MAGRATH. Queen's College, Oxford.

In the fifth edition (1850) of Du Mersan's ' Chansons Rationales et Populaires de la France/ at p. 230, the song ' Ah ! vous dirai-je, Maman,' has six verses. Nos. 1 and 2 are the same practically as 1 and 3 on p. 131 ; the others are different.

The English publisher of the words and music would have found the process of anastatic printing serviceable.

MERVARID.

RECRUITING FOR AGINCOTJRT IN 1415 (12 S. i. 124). A traditional version of this ballad, entitled ' King Henrie the Fifth's Conquest,' is to be found in Mr. J. H. Dixon's ' Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England,' published by the Percy Society in 1846. It was taken down by Mr. Dixon from the singing of Francis King, well known in the Yorkshire dales as " the Skipton Minstrel." Stanzas xi. and xii. are here given :

Go, call up Cheshire and Lancashire, And Derby hills, that are so free ; Not a married man, nor a widow's son,

For the widow's cry shall not go with me. They called up Cheshire and Lancashire,

And Derby lads that were so free, Not a married man nor a widow's son, Yet they w ere jovial bold companie.

A slightly different version is reprinted from an old broadsheet by Mr. Llewellynn Jewitt in his ' Ballads and Songs of Derby- shire ' :

Recruit me Cheshire and Lancashire,

And Derby hills that are so free ; No marry 'd man, or widow 's son,

For no widow's curse shall go with me. They recruited Cheshire and Lancashire,

And perby Hills that are so free, No marry'd man, nor widr,w s son,

Yet there was a jovial bold company.

The evidence that is available as to the date of the composition of the ballad is very slight. According to Mr. Dixon it can be traced to the sixteenth century ; and Mr. Jewitt informs us that

" a tradition still obtains in the Peak that when Henry V. was recruiting Derbyshire and the adjoining counties, he declared that he would take no married man, and that no widow's son should be of his company."

Mr. Endell Tyler emphatically states that the ballad is of ancient origin," and that it was probably written and sung within a few years of Henry's expedition to France

(' Henry of Monmouth,' ii. 121). From the- concluding lines of the ballad, we are led to believe that it may have been composed just after Henry's marriage with Katha- rine :

And the fairest flower in all French land, To the rose of England I will give free.

Whatever the date of its composition may be, it undoubtedly ranks among the earliest of our English songs, and Mr. Tyler was of the opinion that the various renderings which exist may be accounted for by the fact that it was handed down orally from father to son.

In view of the particular reference in the

ballad to Cheshire, Lancashire, and Derby,

it is worthy of note that Henry V. was Duke

of Lancaster c.,nd Earl of Chester and Derby,

G. E. MANWARING/

REBELLION AT ETON (12 S. i. 90). Probably the refeience which HARROVIAN wants is The Observer of Jan. 2, 1916, in which the following paragraph is reprinted from The Observer of Dec. 31, 1815 :

" The spirit of insubordination in Eton School vsas entirely quelled before the Christmas recess by the exemplary expulsion of the five boys who refused to submit to the discipline of flogging for their cruel conduct to a fag in their dame's house : they said they would have submitted to the infliction had they not been sentenced to it at the request of their dame."

I need scarcely say that Dr. Keate w r as head master when this incident, not worthy of the word " rebellion," occurred. I have found nothing about it in any of my books about Eton. ROBERT PIERPOINT.

ENGLISH PRAYER BOOK PRINTED AT VERDUN, 1810 (11 S. xi. 116, sub * English Prisoners in France'). DR. CLIPPINGDALE does not seem to be aware that he possesses a choice book, of which I hope that he will take great care. This Prayer Book was printed at Verdun in 1810 for the use of the British prisoners of war in France, and the editor was J. B. Maude. The British Museum copy (3408 b. 33) has a letter attached, addressed to Dr. Bliss, as follows :

DEAR DOCTOR, T have not forgotten my

Promise of a Verdun Prayer Bool; printed in 810 and beg your acceptance of this J wish you could call upon me either on Friday or Saturday morning to see our Chapel and also our splendid Communion Plate which is in my room.

Yours truly, Queen's, Wednesday. J. B. MAUDE.

I have a note stating that 1,500 copies the book were printed, but I cannot give my authority for the statement. It is not of very frequent occurrence. B. B. P.