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False Foxes

[ Roud - ; probably Ruth Tongue]

Benji Kirkpatrick sang False Foxes in 2016 on Faustus’ Westpark album Death and Other Animals. They noted:

In her manuscript, Ruth Tongue states that this is “a version of the Mr Fox cantefable but including the Open Grave superstition”

Lyrics

Faustus sing False Foxes

Chorus (after each verse):
Gold and silver and all the world’s wealth,
Who leaves a grave open will fill it himself.

Oh where was I last Saturday night?
I was up in the ivy tree.
False foxes under me, seeking to bury me,
Under the ivy tree.
The boughs did shake and my heart did quake,
To see the grave that they did make,
But I was high and I let it lie.

As they crept home in the dark of the moon,
Under the ivy tree.
They fell in the grave and there died soon,
Under the ivy tree.
False foxes under me, seeking to bury me,
Under the ivy tree.
The boughs did shake and their necks did break
All in the grave that they did make,
But I was high and I let it lie.