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From the North

[Cicely Fox Smith]

Gary and Vera Aspey sang From the North in 1975 as the title track of their first Topic album, From the North. They commented in their sleeve notes:

A hare-hunting song, taken from a collection of Lancashire Hunting Songs by Cicely Fox Smith, 1909. The tune was added by ourselves.

Danny Spooner sang From the North on his 2011 CD The Fox, The Hare and the Poacher’s Fate.

Lyrics

Cicely Fox Smith’s poem From the North

I wish’t I was in Lancashire huntin’ o’ the hare
All across the wide moorlands an’ the hollows brown an’ bare,
Hearkenin’ to the good hounds’ cry, hearkenin’ to the horn,
Far away in Lancashire on a windy morn.

I wish’t I was in Lancashire along o’ folks I know,
Rangin’ o’er the countryside in all the winds that blow
As they blew when I was yet a lad, in the place where I was born,
Far away in Lancashire on a good huntin’ morn.

There’s gradely hounds in Lancashire, as such there always were:
There’s gradely hills in Lancashire as how they’re bleak an’ bare:
There’s jannock lads in Lancashire, and that I tell you true,
An’ I wish’t I was in Lancashire all the day through!