> Folk Music > Songs > The Virginian Lover

The Virginian Lover / The Silk Merchant’s Daughter

[ Roud 420 ; Ballad Index ShAp2124 ; trad.]

Cecil Sharp: English Folk Songs From the Southern Appalachians

Arthur Kyle Davis in Folk-Songs of Virginia lists Pretty Nancy, O with the first line “I am a man of honor, and from Virginia I came” as a version of The Virginian Lover. It was collected by Mr. E.J. Sutherland of Clintwood, Virginia on 17 March 1935 from Mr. M.C. Sutherland of Colley, Virginia, who learned it from his brothers and sisters on Frying Pan about 1890.

Texas Gladden of Salem, Virginia sang a fragment of I Am a Man of Honor to Alan Lomax in August 1941. It was included in 2001 on her Rounder anthology Ballad Legacy. (Note that while Sutherland’s song is listed in the Roud index as #420, Gladden’s is listed as #7124.)

Dellie Norton sang The Silk Merchant’s Daughter to Mike Yates at her home in Sodom Laurel, Madison County, North Carolina on 26 August 1980. This recording was included in 1982 on Yates’ Home Made Music album of Blue Ridge Mountain music from Virginia and North Carolina, Appalachia – The Old Traditions Volume 1 and in 2002 on the Musical Traditions anthology of songs, tunes and stories from Mike Yates’ Appalachian collections, Far in the Mountains Volume 4. Mike Yates noted:

Not the well-known English broadside Silk Merchant’s Daughter (Laws N10, Roud 552) but another, and distinct, song, titled The Virginian Lover by Cecil Sharp (see English Folk Songs From the Southern Appalachians (1932) vol.2, pp.149-50). Sharp collected it in 1916 from Tom Rice, who lived in an area close to where Dellie was living when I met her. Because of Dellie’s free and open-ended melody I have not attempted to put her lines into a verse format. Another recording of Dellie singing this song can be heard on the album High Atmosphere (Rounder CD 0028). According to the notes that accompany this album “what is memorable here is her ornamented style, with pronounced breathing patterns, melodic turns, twists and the vocal flips that she brings to the singing”. Texas Gladden sings a short fragment of the song on Rounder CD 1800 [Ballad Legacy].

Old Spot (Joe Danks and Rowan Piggott) sang The Silk Merchant’s Daughter, “from the singing of Dellie Norton (1898-1993)”, in 2026 on their Scribe album Old Spot II .

Lyrics

Texas Gladden sings I Am a Man of Honor

I am a man of honor
From Virginia I did come.
I courted a pretty fair maiden,
Miss Polly was her name.
I won her affection,
Her love did plainly show.
Her self-conceited brother
Did cause our overthrow.

Dellie Norton sings The Silk Merchant’s Daughter

I am a silkmerchant’s daughter, from London I did came.
I courted a porter, Sweet William was his name.
Her brother being established, so this I do understand,
Said, “Sister, don’t you have him. He’s neither house nor land.
O sister, if you won’t have him, here is two handsome gowns,
Besides two more I’d get you, the best in Cumlers Town.”
This filled her heart with sorrow, she stepped aside and beginned to cry.
Saying, “I’d give all the silks and satin that ever crossed the sea,
So freely would I give them if my friends would all agree.”
When her Sweet William come riding in from town,
Instead of any friendship, all on him she must frown.
“O what’s the matter Polly? What makes you look so sad?
Have you (I) gived you any reason? Or caused you for to be mad?
If I give you any reason, love, it never was my intent,
For you’re the only girl in this wide world I ever loved.”