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There is no apparent connection between the subject of the first and that of the remaining stanzas; and although the first may have been the burden of an older song, it bears no indication of having refered to the clergy of any denomination.

There is scarcely a collection of old English songs in which at least one may not be found to the tune of Green Sleeves. In the West of England it is still sung at harvest-homes to a song beginning, “A pie sat on a pear-tree top;” and at the Maypole still remaining at Ansty, near Blandford, the villagers still dance annually round it to this tune.

The following “Carol for New Year's Day, to the tune of Green Sleeves,” is from a black-letter collection printed in 1642, of which the only copy I have seen is in the Ashmolean Library, Oxford.

The following version of the tune, from The Beggars’ Opera, 1728, is that now best known. I have not found any late or virginal copy which had this second part. The earliest authority for it is The Dancing Master, 1686, and it may have been altered to suit the violin, as the older second part is rather low, and less effective, for the instrument.