> Louis Killen > Songs > One May Morning

A Willing Maid, a Day Too Young / One May Morning

[ Roud 1003 ; Master title: A Willing Maid, a Day Too Young ; G/D 7:1311 ; Ballad Index GrD71311 ; VWML RoudFS/S157046 ; trad.]

Nick Dow: Southern Songster James Reeves: The Idiom of the People

Mr R. Barrett of Piddletown sang One May Morning, As It Happened to Be to H.E.D. Hammond in September 1905. One verse was printed in the Journal of the Folk-Song Society 3 (1907) p.113.

Louis Killen sang One May Morning on his 1965 Topic album Ballads & Broadsides. This track was also included in 1996 on the extended CD reissue of the Topic anthology The Bird in the Bush. Angela Carter noted on the original album:

In the eternal springtime of English love songs a girl tries to fend off the advances of an importunate young fellow man by telling him that she is too young; but he proves to her the truth of the old saying, “when they’re big enough, they’re old enough”. Told from the point of view of the girl who, as in one American version, later brings forth a little baby boy after the statutory nine months—“and me not fifteen years of age”, the song can be intolerably poignant; most versions, though, are emphatically masculine as this bawdy guffaw. Hammond collected this treatment of a widespread theme in Dorset in the early years of the century, but it was deemed sufficiently indelicate to bring a blush to Edwardian cheeks and was duly doctored for publication. This is how Hammond heard it first of all.

Lyrics

Mr R. Barrett sings One May Morning, As It Happened to Be

As I walked out one May morning,
One May morning, as it happened to be,
Yo! there I met a fair pretty maid,
She came trippaling over the green to mo.
To my right fol the dol, fol the diddle fol the dee!
Right fol the dol, fol the diddle fol the dee!
She came trippaling over the plains to mo.

Louis Killen sings One May Morning

As I walked out on a May morning,
One May morning, as it happened to be,
It was there I spied a fair pretty maid
Came trippaling over the plains to me.
With my right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
My right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
Yo! There I spied a fair pretty maid
Came trippaling over the plains to me.

I placed my arms all around her waist
And gently laid her on the ground.
I kissed her once, I kissed her twice
And found she was not a day too young.
To my right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
My right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
Yo! I kissed her once, I kissed her twice
And found she was not a day too young.

“Oh now, young man, oh then,” said she,
“Since you have had your will of me
And robbed me off my liberty,
Pray tell me when the wedding day it is to be.”
To my right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
My right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
“Since you have had your will of me
Pray tell me when the wedding day it is to be.”

“Oh my wedding day it never won’t be
It’s not my intent to married be.
So go your way contented to be,
You’ve had your share as well as me.”
To my right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
My right fol de rol, fol de riddle, fol de ree!
“You go your way contented to be,
You’ve had your share as well as me.”