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The Cruel Mother / Greenwood Sidey / Fine Flowers in the Valley / The Lady of York

[ Roud 9 ; Master title: The Cruel Mother ; Child 20 ; G/D 2:193 ; TYG 73 ; Ballad Index C020 ; MusTrad DB06 , DB22 ; VWML CJS2/9/1333 , CJS2/9/2371 , AW/6/213 ; GlosTrad Roud 9 ; Wiltshire 94 ; DT CRUELMOT , CRUELMO2 ; Mudcat 17087 , 75743 ; trad.]

Norman Buchan and Peter Hall: The Scottish Folksinger Nick Dow: Southern Songster David Herd: Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs, Heroic Ballads, etc., Second Volume Alexander Keith: Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads and Ballad Airs James Kinsley: The Oxford Book of Ballads Ewan MacColl: Folk Songs and Ballads of Scotland John Jacob Niles: The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles John Ord: Bothy Songs and Ballads Roy Palmer: Everyman’s Book of British Ballads Songs of the Midlands Frank Purslow: Marrow Bones Steve Roud, Julia Bishop: The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs Cecil J. Sharp: One Hundred English Folksongs Ken Stubbs: The Life of a Man Ralph Vaughan Williams and A.L. Lloyd: The Penguin Book of English Folk Songs Mike Yates: Traveller’s Joy

Cecilia Costello sang The Cruel Mother on 16 January 1954 in Birmingham to Maria Slocombe. This BBC recording was included in 1975 on her eponymous Leader album, Cecilia Costello and in 2014 on her Musical Traditions anthology Old Fashioned Songs. Rod Stradling commented in the accompanying booklet:

This ballad is full of ancient beliefs, and seems to be of Scottish origin; it first appeared in Herd, Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs, dated 1776. It has been collected all over Britain and North America, though only four singers are recorded as having known it in Ireland—and none of them were from Co Roscommon. Child knew of 16 versions, Bronson 56 and Roud 325. Mrs Costello learned her version—as she did many of her songs—from her father, when she was a child.

Thomas Moran of Mohill, Co Leitrim, sang a composite of The Maid and the Palmer (verses) and The Cruel Mother (chorus) to Séamus Ennis in December 1954. This BBC recording 22035 was published on the anthology The Child Ballads 1 (The Folk Songs of Britain Volume 4; Caedmon 1961; Topic 1968). The extended 2000 CD reissue on Rounder Records has The Cruel Mother as a composite of verses from Duncan Burke from Perth, Cecilia Costello, and Thomas Moran.

Ewan MacColl sang The Cruel Mother, in 1956 on his and A.L. Lloyd’s Riverside album The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Volume IV. This and 28 other ballads from this series were reissued in 2009 on MacColl’s Topic CD Ballads: Murder·Intrigue·Love·Discord. Kenneth S. Goldstein commented in the album’s notes:

Ballad tales of infanticide almost identical to The Cruel Mother have been collected in Denmark and Germany, though no conclusion has been drawn from these data concerning the possible origin of the British ballad in either of those countries. Most of Child’s texts were from Scotland and the ballad has remained alive in tradition there to this day. It is also known in England and has been collected frequently in America.

Child believed the ballad ending, in which the mother’s fate in hell and other penance is predicted, was borrowed from The Maid and the Palmer (Child 21); Gavin Greig, noting the frequency with which this theme appeared in Scottish versions, and aware that The Maid and the Palmer was little known in Scotland, believed the ending to be an integral part of the ballad, though it did not appear in earlier versions. This ending still persists, for the version sung by MacColl (and containing this ending) was recently learned by him from Margaret Logan of Corsham, Wiltshire.

Ewan MacColl also sang The Cruel Mother on his 1961 Prestige album The Best of Ewan MacColl where he noted:

The Cruel Mother (Child #20) is well known in England, Ireland, America and Scotland, the best texts and tunes coming from the latter. Its tale of infanticide is a familiar one throughout northern Europe. I learned this superb version from a 74 year old Perthshire singer, Margaret Logan, in Corsham, Wiltshire, in 1953.

A.L. Lloyd sang The Cruel Mother, as printed in his and Vaughan William’s 1959 book Penguin Book of English Folk Songs, in 1964 on his and Ewan MacColl’s Topic album English and Scottish Folk Ballads. He was accompanied by Alf Edwards on concertina. He commented in a quite a long essay:

The ballad seems to be old, for it is full of primitive folklore notions such as the knife from which blood can never be washed (the instance of Lady Macbeth comes to mind). Also primitive is the idea that the dead who have not undergone the ceremony that initiates them fully into the world of the living (in this case, christening) can never be properly received and incorporated into the world of the dead, but must return to plague the living. Some scholars think The Cruel Mother may have been brought to England by invading Norsemen, since practically the same story occurs in Danish balladry (...). Verse by verse, the Danish sets of the ballad so closely resemble the English that it seems unlikely that the importation took place so long ago. More probably, it is a case of an ancient folk tale being turned into a lyrical ballad, perhaps within the last four hundred years, and spreading in various parts of Europe, possibly with the help of printed versions all deriving from a single original (whether that original was English or Danish or in some other language, our present researchers do not tell us).

The terrible story has had a particular fascination for children and the ballad became a game-song. A folklorist saw the game being played in a Lancashire orphanage in 1915. The children called it The Lady Drest in Green.

There was a lady drest in green,
Fair a lair a lido,
There was a lady drest in green,
Down by the greenwood side, o

The song describes how the lady kills her baby with a pen-knife, tries to wash off the blood, goes home to lie down, is aroused by three “bobbies” at the door, who extract a confession from her and rush her off to prison, and “That was the end of Mrs. Green”. It is a ring game. Two children in the middle impersonate Mrs. Green and the baby, following the action of the song. The children in the ring dance round, singing the refrains, until the “bobbies” rush in and seize the mother, when the ring breaks up. In his London Street Games (1931 ed.), Norman Douglas prints a corrupt version current in East and South-East London during the First World War. The ballad has remained a great favourite and is still to be heard from country singers all over the British Isles and in America (where sometimes the event is given a railway setting, “down by the old Greenwood Siding”). The Dorian (Re mode) tune we use was obtained by H.E.D. Hammond from Mrs. Bowring of Cerne Abbas, Dorset.

Shirley Collins recorded The Cruel Mother twice, first for her 1960 album False True Lovers and the second time in 1967 for The Sweet Primeroses (reissued on Fountain of Snow). She noted on the second album:

This cautionary ballad has everything, including one of the greatest of tunes. Ewan MacColl taught it to me when I was twenty. A flat, documentary opening, reporting a private act by conscience-torn young girl. Then the confrontation of the young mother by the ghosts of her murdered twin babies, and her damnation. The refrain has the quality of an incantation, raising one wretched human being to an archetype of remorse.

Lucy Stewart sang Down by the Greenwood Sidie O on her 1961 Folkways album Traditional Singer From Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Kenneth S. Goldstein noted:

Ballad tales of infanticide almost identical to The Cruel Mother have been collected in Denmark and Germany, though no conclusions have been drawn concerning the possible origin of the British ballad in either of those countries.

Most of Child’s texts were from Scotland and the ballad has remained alive in tradition there to this day. The ballad is also known in England and has been collected frequently in America.

Lucy’s text, very graphic in its presentation of the ballad tale, is especially interesting in two respects. The opening verse has been borrowed from an old bawdy ballad known to Robert Burns as Logan Braes [Roud 6843; G/D 6:1122]. It is an admirable beginning for a ballad of birth and infanticide resulting from an illicit relationship. Few other texts have the children murdered by being choked with a ribbon. The great majority of versions have the children stabbed to death by their mother.

For additional texts and information, see: Child, Volume I, p. 218ff; Greig & Keith, pp. 21-23; Ord, p. 459; Coffin, pp. 50-51.

Robin Hall sang The Cruel Mother in 1960 on his Collector album Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads. The sleeve notes commented:

This ballad tells how a king’s daughter, pregnant by one of her father’s servants, took the lives of her newborn twins rather than suffer the rage of the king. Later she sees two bonnie young boys playing outside the castle wall. They are the ghosts of her murdered babies come to pass judgement on her.

Together with this powerful story, we have in this version a tune of great beauty.

Vicki Whelan sang There Was a Lady Dressed in Green to Mike Yates at her home in Manchester in 1964. This recording was included in 2001 on the Musical Traditions anthology of songs and music from the Mike Yates collection, Up in the North and Down in the South. He noted:

This is a children’s version of the ballad The Cruel Mother, which, at one time, must have been an extremely popular ballad—Roud has 253 examples, but only 39 are from England and there have been only two other recordings; Ben Baxter of Southrepps, Norfolk, and Mrs Cecilia Costello of Birmingham, were both collected in the fifties. This latter and recordings by Duncan Burke and Thomas Moran can be heard on Rounder 1775, and the recent one by Jock Duncan on Springthyme SPRCD 1039. Professor Child cited many European variants and Anne Gilchrist gives examples of the conversion of the ballad into a children’s singing game (Journal of the Folk Song Society iii, p.8) including one from Lancashire, 1915—which is where Vicki learned this as a child, from her mother in Salford.

Ian Campbell sang The Cruel Mither in 1965 on the Campbell Family’s Topic album The Singing Campbells. Peter A. Hall and Arthur Argo noted:

Gavin Greig collected five versions of this ballad in Aberdeenshire, all to plainer tunes than that sung here. Ian’s tune, in fact, comes from Ewan MacColl’s aunt, Margaret Logan, a native of Perthshire. The texts of some of the first collected Scottish sets, notably in Herd’s Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs and Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum, suggest pre-Christian origins for the ballad. This interesting version, too, gives us much of the powerful pagan mysticism.

Hedy West sang The Cruel Mother in 1967 on her Topic album Ballads. She noted:

This ballad was already circulating as a printed broadside before the end of the seventeenth century, but chances are it was an old song by then. It is related to another song concerning a legend of Mary Magdalene who was supposed to have borne three children—one by her father, one by her brother, one by the parish priest—and murdered them all. Jesus imposes on her a number of penances, and when they have been suffered, a place is prepared for her in heaven. Whether the Christian ballad is a re-working of The Cruel Mother, or The Cruel Mother is a secularisation of the Magdalene legend, would be hard to say. In its Christian form, the ballad is known all the way from Finland to Catalonia, by way of Czechoslovakia. In its ‘Cruel Mother’ form it’s not nearly so widespread. The Cruel Mother is thought to have come to America with the first wave of British migrants before 1650. The version here was collected by Cecil Sharp in North Carolina in 1918 [VWML CJS2/9/2371] .

Dave and Toni Arthur sang The Cruel Mother in 1970 on their Trailer album Hearken to the Witches Rune. They noted in their songbook:

A song once banned on Irish radio for being too cruel. Cruel or not, it is a song widely sung by traditional singers, and Ken Stubbs in his book The Life of a Man says that claims have been put forward that the song pre-dates the Norman Conquest.

Martin Carthy sang Cruel Mother on his 1971 album Landfall. He commented in the record’s sleeve notes:

The Cruel Mother comes from the singing of Lucy Stewart as collected by the American folklorist Kenneth Goldstein. Apparently many people quite close to her had no idea that she was a singer until he came along, but with him to coax her, she gradually unbent, and came out with many many songs, a lot of them really fine versions of the ballads.

Barbara Dickson sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 1971 on her Decca album From the Beggar’s Mantle… Fringed With Gold. The terse album notes say that she got it “from Gavin Greig’s Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads” but her quite different version is actually version #1 in Bronson’s The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads.

Frankie Armstrong sang The Cruel Mother in 1972 on her Topic album Lovely on the Water. A.L. Lloyd noted:

A hard and eerie international tale. Unmarried Mother Slays Unwanted Babe; but there’s more to it than a banal Sunday newspaper account. In most versions, the lady has triplets, kills them all, and binds them with her headscarf, her belt, her garters, to prevent the little ghosts from walking, but back they come (primitive people believe the spirits of infants that die under three years are specially malicious) to condemn her. A nightmare touch is provided by the bloodstains on the murder weapon that cannot be washed away. Lady Macbeth would have appreciated that bit. Children used this ballad as a ring-game, sung and danced with a gay lilt, two in the middle as mother and baby, three other children as avengers who chase the mother in and out of the circle. Annie Gilchrist noted a version in the Southport Orphanage in 1915 [VWML AGG/1/18/1/39] . Child psychiatrists, forward, please.

Dave Burland sang The Cruel Mother in 1972 on his eponymous Trailer album, Dave Burland, and in 1975 on his album Songs and Buttered Haycocks. He noted on the first album:

A composite version of this ballad; the words are ones which I have sung on and off for some years, the tune is from the ballad Bonnie Annie from Gavin Greig’s Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads and Ballad Airs.

Tom Gilfellon sang The Cruel Mother in 1972 on his Topic album Loving Mad Tom. He noted:

Gavin Greig’s Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads and Ballad Airs provided the basic source, many years ago, of this fine song. English variants of the ballad don’t seem to be quite as explicit as to the nature of the punishment to be endured by the unfortunate mother.

Linda Adams sang The Sun Shines Fair on Carlisle Wall in 1975 on her and Paul Adams’ Sweet Folk and Country album of songs and ballads of Cumbria, Far Over the Fell, and she sang The Sun Shines Fair on the 1997 Fellside anthology Ballads where Paul Adams noted:

This is an intriguing version of a very ancient ballad. The theme of infanticide is rare in itself in ballads, but apart from that, it is the standard story of a pregnancy by someone of the wrong class. Usually it has a “Down by the Greenwood Sidey-O” refrain, but this version locates it in the Border city of Carlisle. Linda learnt it from her English teacher and singer, Ann Dickens. A version is printed in [Sydney Gilpin’s] Songs and Ballads of Cumberland [1866, pp. 497-98]. Paul Adams added a first verse from another version to help put the story in context. A number of folklore elements have disappeared from this version, e.g. the colour green, the oak tree, etc. The song, like one or two other ballads, has been found in the form of a children’s game song.

Lizzie Higgins sang The Cruel Mother in 1975 on her Topic album Up and Awa’ Wi’ the Laverock. This track was also included in 1998 on the Topic anthology O’er His Grave the Grass Grew Green (The Voice of the People Volume 3). Peter Hall noted:

The versions of this song may be divided into two distinct types: those in which the final punishment is described extensively in a series of verses (probably borrowed from The Maid and the Palmer, Child 21) and others stating the retribution simply in a single verse. The present set is of the latter type and concentrates concisely on the central events, dropping the usual introductory verses. It is related to the version sent to Kinloch early in the 19^th century by the Beattie family of Stonehaven, suggesting a regional continuity of over 150 years. The air appears as a published bagpipe tune Greenwoodside, that title taken from the refrain of the ballad. It was passed to Lizzie by her father, who learned it from his mother, and it may well have been in the repertoire of her father, the piper, Donald Stewart.

Silly Wizard sang Carlisle Wall in 1976 on their eponymous Transatlantic album, Silly Wizard.

Archie Fisher sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 1977 in Jean Redpath’s BBC television series Ballad Folk.

Alison McMorland sang The Cruel Mother in 1977 on her Tangent album Belt wi’ Colours Three. Hamish Henderson noted:

Lucy Stewart was source-singer of this powerful version of an international ballad which has crossed many language frontiers and has driven a shaft deep down into human consciousness. Lucy’s opening stanza which is borrowed from an unrelated bawdy song, establishes the fact of seduction. And (as Alison points out in a letter) the unusual lines—

Right wantly has she gane home
That nane might meddle with her fair fame,

pinpoint the fear of an unmarried mother that she will be the victim of the community’s malicious gossip. These touches add enormously to the impact made by this particular version. Alison adds: “Whenever people say to me that folksongs are archaic and have no relevance to today’s way of life, I think of The Cruel Mother.”

It is not without significance that the ballad has been recorded, in both Scotland and Ireland, as a vehicle for children’s ring games. This track and the following, were recorded at an enjoyable evening at the Edinburgh Folk Club.

Pete and Chris Coe recorded The Cruel Mother in 1979 for their album Game of All Fours. According to their album sleeve notes, it “is based on the version sung by Mrs Cecilia Costello who lived in Aston, Birmingham”.

Mirk sang The Cruel Mother on their 1979 album Moddan’s Bower.

Lisa Null sang The Cruel Mother in 1980 on her and Bill Shute’s album American Primitive. She noted:

The Cruel Mother, Child #20, is a gut-level nightmare for any unmarried woman. Pregnant by her father’s clerk, the lady in question murders her twin babies and goes home as if nothing has happened. The ghosts of her babies return to taunt her and to expose the dark underside of her maternal sentiments. I found this version in Bertrand Bronson’s The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1959). While not the most beautiful version, the monotony of its tune and childish little refrain give it the macabre feel of a nursery rhyme gone berserk.

The Clutha sang The Cruel Mither at Lowell House, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA on 3 October 1981. A recording of this concert was released in 2019 on their CD Live From Harvard.

Steve Turner sang Down by the Greenwood Side on his 1982 Fellside album Jigging One Now. He noted:

This Appalachian version of The Cruel Mother comes from The Ballad Tree collection. I learned it from Mick Bramwich of Birmingham.

Steve also sang The Cruel Mother in 2023 on his Tradition Bearers album Curious Times. He noted:

I have a long history with this version of one of the most gruesome Child Ballads (Number 20). I learnt it from Mick Bramwich, the fine singer and concertina player from Birmingham in the 1970’s. He told me that this version came from Bowling Green Kentucky—one of the many American and Canadian versions of this song. I first recorded it with Nic Jones on my second album Jigging One Now in late 1981 which sadly turned out to be Nic’s last recording before his career ending accident in February 1982. I decided to rejig it for this album.

Jim Eldon sang The Lady of York on his 1984 album I Wish There Was No Prisons. He noted:

Sung for James Smart by Elizabeth Wharton and her brothers, Shropshire gypsies, 13 July 1885 (Shropshire Folk Lore, Charlotte S. Burne [VWML RoudFS/S202438] ).

Heather Heywood sang The Cruel Mother in 1987 on her Greentrax album Some Kind of Love. She noted:

An old ballad but with plenty of relevance to today. I sang this years ago and recently sang it again and the desperation felt by the mother in the song suddenly hit me. A love affair which wasn’t convenient resulted in twins which she killed at birth ‘thinking tae gang a maiden hame…’ She then lives the torment of seeing children at play and thinking what might have been. Things don’t change much over the years, although nowadays perhaps a similar act of convenience wouldn’t provoke a ballad.

I can’t remember where I learnt this song from, it just seems to have appeared.

Seannachie sang Fine Flowers in the Valley on their 1988 album Take Note!.

Steeleye Span recorded The Cruel Mother, a song “—before birth control, before the Social Services, before tranquillisers—” (from the album’s sleeve notes),d for their 1989 album Tempted and Tried, and Maddy Prior sang it on her 1997 album Flesh and Blood.

Elizabeth Stewart sang The Cruel Mither on her 1992 cassette ’Atween You an’ Me; this track was included in 2004 on her Elphinstone Institute anthology Binnorie. She also sang it during the Fife Traditional Singing Festival, Collessie, Fife in May 2005, which was recorded and released in the following year on the festival anthology For Friendship and for Harmony (Old Songs & Bothy Ballads Volume 2). Thomas A. McKean noted in the Elphinstone album’s booklet:

The opening verse seems in its natural place here, though it is classified as a separate song in Greig-Duncan (Logan’s Braes, no. 1122). Kenneth Goldstein noted that it is an ideally evocative introduction to a story of illicit sex and infanticide (Lucy Stewart, notes). One wonders if Traveller singers in Greig’s own village of New Deer, only a few miles from Fetterangus, might well have had a similar variant. This uncompromising ballad is found all over the English-speaking world and one can only imagine the social context which may have led a woman to take this most incomprehensibly drastic of steps. Versions often finish with extensive details of the mother’s supernatural punishment in various levels of purgatory—‘seven years a-ringing the bell’, ‘seven years a-burning in Hell’, and the like—verses shared with Child 21, The Maid and the Palmer, Child maintained that The Cruel Mother borrowed these verses from the latter song, but Greig points out that The Maid was not to be found in the North-East, nor hardly in Scotland as a whole, for that matter. David Buchan has written on the connections in The Maid, the Palmer, and the Cruel Mother, Malahat Review, 3 (1967), 98-107.

Old Blind Dogs sang The Rose and the Lindsey O in 1995 on their Lochshore album Legacy. Ian F. Benzie noted:

This song is based on the version found in the Child collection of Ballads #20. Learned from the singing of The Gaugers.

I don’t know of any recording of this song by The Gaugers, though.

Mick West sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 1995 on his Lochshore album Fine Flowers and Foolish Glances. He noted:

I first heard this short remnant of the Cruel Mother ballad from Archie Fisher. It was collected by Robert Burns for Johnson’s Scots Musical Museum published in 1796.

Jock Duncan sang The Cruel Mother in 1996 on his Springthyme album Ye Shine Whar Ye Stan!. Peter Shepheard noted:

Jock learned this ancient supernatural ballad from George Kidd, farm grieve at a neighbouring farm back in around 1935 when Jock was 10 or 12 years old—and he never heard the song from anyone else. The ballad is number 20 in F.J. Child’s The English and Scottish Popular Ballads and Greig-Duncan has three tunes and four fairly full texts from the North East (Last Leaves & GD 193). The ballad is still in the living tradition in England and in North America and Bronson has 47 versions, texts and tunes, in his The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads. But to find a new version in the 1990s as full as Jock’s is remarkable—and sung with such style and authority.

Jock: “I used tae visit him quite a lot, Geordie. He wis grieve in the 30s at North Faddenhill—we were South Faddenhill. Fen he retired he bought a wee croftie away in the hill o Auchmunziel at New Deer and there he scuttered aboot, rearin a calf, and keepin a hen or two. Geordie used tae sing that song tae me even fen he wis retired. It wis one o his favourites. It wis in the 50s the last I saw o Geordie.”

Jock’s version is unique in many ways but is perhaps most similar to the North East version collected by Peter Buchan in the early 1800s (Buchan: ’Ballads of the North of Scotland 2:217 / Child 20 version I). This includes the use of flower and plant symbolism in the chorus: the rose being the flower of passion and the lindie—the linden or lime tree, having significance as a holy tree giving protection against evil somewhat akin to the Rowan.

Norman Kennedy sang The Cruel Mother at live concerts in Aberdeen in 1996 that were recorded by Tom Spiers and released in 2002 on his Tradition Bearers album Live in Scotland. He noted:

Most of the big ballads, like this one, I got from Jeannie [Robertson]. They were great company to me during the long hours I used to work at the big old handlooms, or treading back and forth, spinning yarn on the walking wheel.

Sue Brown and Lorraine Irwing sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 1997 on their WildGoose album Call & Cry. They noted:

A version of The Cruel Mother, a ballad well known in the English and Scottish traditions and in Denmark.

Kate Burke and Ruth Hazleton sang The Cruel Mother on their 1998 album The Bee-Loud Glade.

Charlotte Greig sang The Cruel Mother on her 1999 album Down in the Valley.

Sandra Kerr, Nancy Kerr and James Fagan sang The Cruel Mother in 1999 on their eponymous Fellside album Scalene. Sandra Kerr noted:

Bronson gives forty-seven versions of this immensely widespread ballad, but this one is not amongst them. We know it to be American and that children over the centuries have transformed the original into street songs or clapping games, with bloodthirsty relish—the oral tradition meets the video nasty? (Old Mother Leigh and Down by the River Silem are other variants and both big favourites in the playground.) Nancy was sung to sleep with it. Not an ideal lullaby.

Nancy Kerr returned to The Cruel Mother in 2015 on Simpson·Cutting·Kerr’s Topic album Murmurs where she noted:

A relentlessly re-told tragedy, this set of words to Child ballad 20 were new to me, though I’ve sung and heard other versions since childhood. I loved the symbolic presence of the various trees and the summations of grief, and decided to set it to a fittingly dark, relentless 5/4 melody.

Elspeth Cowie sang Cruel Mither on her 2000 album Naked Voice. She noted:

There are many versions of this gruesome tale. I sing it to the pipe tune The Greenwoodside.

Moira Craig sang The Cruel Mother on her 2000 album On ae Bonny Day. She noted:

Infanticide and illegitimacy have been recurrent themes in many European ballads. This version is from the Greig Duncan collection. She kills the babies to conceal the fact that she is no longer a virgin and of marriageable material. However, her conscience plays tricks on her and she awaits her fate.

Maureen Jelks sang The Cruel Mother in 2000 on her CD Eence Upon a Time. She noted:

I had heard this song many times, but it was not until I heard Jock Duncan sing it that I felt moved to learn it. This ballad is to be found in many collections, Greig, Child, etc. It is a story of ghosts and infanticide.

macAlias (Gill Bowman and Karine Polwart) sang Fine Floo’ers in the Valley and Bonny at Morn in 2002 on their Greentrax album Highwired. They noted:

Scottish balladry abounds with deaths caused by the ubiquitous wee pen-knife. Fine Floo’ers is probably the best known variant of the Cruel Mother ballad in which the victim is her own baby. We layer it with snatches of the lullaby Bonnie At Morn, because both the airs and the themes fit so well. Lullabies are often downright bleak or creepy affairs, revealing a great deal about the fears and stresses of parenthood. Just as well the wee ones can’t understand the words, really.

Emily Smith sang The Cruel Mother in 2002 on her Foot Stompin’ album A Day Like Today. She noted:

One of the big ballads of the Scots singing tradition. This version of the tragic tale comes from the singing of Lucy Stewart, a member of one of Scotland’s most famous travelling families; the Stewarts of Fetterangus.

Wendy Weatherby sang Bonny at Morn in 2002 on her Lochshore album Two Loves.

June Tabor sang The Cruel Mother in 2003 on her album An Echo of Hooves. According to the album’s sleeve notes, the tune was collected by Cecil Sharp and Maud Karpeles from James Chisholm of Nellysford, Virginia in 1918, and the words were collated from other Appalachian versions also collected by the two.

Katherine Campbell sang Rose o Malindie (from the in-verse refrain “Hey for the rose o Malindie O”) in 2004 on her Springthyme album The Songs of Amelia and Jane Harris, which is a companion to the book The Song Repertoire of Amelia and Jane Harris, edited by Emily Lyle.

Ed Rennie sang The Cruel Mother in 2004 on his Fellside CD Narrative. He noted:

Based on a version by Shirley Collins who in turn had the song from Ewan MacColl. Unlike many variants of this story, a possible explanation is offered for why the Parson’s Daughter acted so: “… thinking a maiden to return home.” Possibly in reaction to her betrayal and abandonment, post natal depression, social pressure. Whatever the reason, her shame and guilt from the deed are palpable in all versions and clearly the story struck a deep chord with generations of singers, judging by how many variants there are.

Jon Loomes sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 2005 on his Fellside CD Fearful Symmetry. He noted:

Bronson again, Child Ballads 20 and 21 collide in a thick fog. (Does this make it Bronson pickle?) There are no apes in this version, which is frankly a little disappointing. If I were going to spend seven years in hell, I’d expect there to be apes, of Chimpanzees at the very least.

This is for my Mum, who as far as I know, didn’t stab me at birth, although some would say she should have done.

Alasdair Roberts sang The Cruel Mother on his 2005 CD No Earthly Man. He noted:

The melody and refrain of this version of the ancient infanticide ballad are adapted from the singing of Andy Stewart on the self-titled 1976 LP by the Scottish group Silly Wizard, where it is called Carlisle Wall. The lyric here is mostly a composite of three sources—that version, a version recorded in 1975 by the Aberdeen-born singer Lizzie Higgins, and, particularly in regard to the final dialogue section, an English version by Shirley Collins on her 1967 Topic Records LP The Sweet Primeroses.

Helen Woodall sang The Cruel Mother in 2005 on the Darset half of the Forest Tracks album Folk Songs From Hampshire and Dorset. Paul March noted:

Marrow Bones p. 26. From Mrs. Case, Sydling St. Nicholas, September 1907 [VWML HAM/5/34/23] .

Purslow notes: “The tragic theme of this ballad is well known throughout the world.” The story is of a girl who is about to be married but is with child by another man. Wishing to appear still a virgin she murders her children when they are born. Later she sees their ghosts who tell of the fate awaiting her for her wicked deed. Once upon a time this was one of the best loved ballads in England, as shown by the large number of beautiful variants of the tunes and of the refrains. The Cruel Mother, one of the oldest ballads, is here given a very up-to-date treatment.

Paul and Liz Davenport sang Under the Leaves in 2006 as the title track of their Hallamshire Traditions album Under the Leaves. They noted:

The Cruel Mother is, on the face of it, one of the most gruelling of the ballad themes. One common refrain in this family of songs, ‘All alone, a lonely-o’ indicates the desperation of this unmarried mother. This version started life as a lyric written by our eldest son, Gavin. The song is about the injustices faced by young women in earlier times when pregnancy was considered to be the woman’s fault and the man’s part was virtually ignored.

Stanley Robertson sang She’s Leaned Her Back on his 2006 Elphinstone Institute CD Rum Scum Scoosh!.

Richard Thompson sang Bonnie St. Johnstone in 2006 on his live CD and DVD 1000 Years of Popular Music.

Chris Foster sang The Cruel Mother on his 2008 CD Outsiders. He noted:

I have always been struck by the archetypal power of this ballad, which has appeared in many guises from the blood-curdlingly tragic to the comic. However, I was always put off singing the song by the lack of sympathy for the mother, who is after all in a dreadful situation herself.

During the 1970s I was lucky to hear the great Aberdeenshire singer Lizzie Higgins on several occasions. A few years ago I heard Vic Smith, who runs the excellent Royal Oak Folk Club in Lewes, Sussex, singing a wonderful version of the song which he learned from Lizzie. I then realised that here was an altogether more ambiguous take on the story and I built this version from that starting point.

Kerfuffle learned this ballad from the singing of Chris Coe and recorded it in 2008 as Down by the Greenwood Side for their fourth CD, To the Ground. This video shows Kerfuffle singing Down by the Greenwood Side at The Otley Black Sheep Folk Festival 2008:

Brian Peters sang All Alone and Lonely on his 2008 CD Songs of Trial and Triumph. He noted:

I’ve been singing this ballad for some years, albeit in a different version—that collected from Mrs. Bigney of Pictou, Nova Scotia—for most of them. Over the years I made minor revisions and added extra verses, although the Pictou text remains the foundation for what I sing now. Verse 2 belongs to that text—although I tweaked it to make it rhyme—and the “owl in the wood” came from there, too. The penances in v14, however, are from Peter Cole, recorded in Pennsylvania U.S.A. in 1929, while the attempts to clean knife and hands were in a version sung by Mrs. Hollingsworth of Thaxted, England in 1921. Mrs. Hollingsworth had the song collected from her on two occasions separated by ten years, and it’s interesting to note that her tune varied significantly between the two.

A couple of years ago I came across a version of the ballad printed in The Living Tradition magazine that had a Mixolydian melody I rather liked and an interesting five-beat bar on the third line of the verse, although the lyrics were brief and sketchy. So Mrs. Woodbury’s tune (notated by Cecil Sharp) [VWML CJS2/9/1333] became the vehicle for the set of words I’d already put together over the years. Calling it All Alone and Lonely—which is far less judgemental than Child’s preferred Cruel Mother and begins to suggest the desperation of the single mother in an age when such a situation carried a far greater stigma than today (read your Tess of the D’Urbervilles)—was Chris Coe’s suggestion. The singers who sang the ballad in tradition more commonly called it The Greenwood Side or similar.

Rubus sang this as Greenwood Sidey in 2008 on their CD Nine Witch Knots. Emily Portman noted:

A revenant ballad of the darkest kind in which a mother is visited by the ghosts of her children. My source for this version of The Cruel Mother is Birmingham singer Cecilia Costello, who recounted how her father would sit her on his knee and say “now don’t you do what this cruel mother did”. It seems this song has long acted as a moral tale, first emerging in print in the seventeenth century, at the same time as the crime of infanticide became registered as an offence separate from homicide. Disturbingly, Vic Gammon tells us that “more people (overwhelmingly women) were executed for infanticide than for witchcraft in this period” (see Vic’s book Desire, Drink and Death in English Folk and Vernacular Song, 1600-1900). At a time when female worth and virginity were so intertwined and postnatal depression was unheard of, is it surprising that infanticide was running rife when this song emerged? Rather than damning the protagonist as a cruel mother I think of her as a desperate woman caught in the trappings of a time when illegitimate pregnancy could result in being outcast from family and society. The final descriptive verses of the lady’s transformations appear to describe the penance she must serve via metamorphosis.

Chris Wood sang The Lady of York on his 2008 CD Trespasser. He noted:

Most people refer to the song as The Cruel Mother. I just don’t buy it. Thank you to Lauren McCormick from whom I learnt this song.

Bella Hardy sang Cruel Mother in 2009 on her CD In the Shadow of Mountains.

Maz O’Connor sang The Cruel Mother as one of the Young Folk Awards finalists on the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards 2009 CD.

Jon Boden sang The Cruel Mother as the 6 July 2010 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day and he sang Greenwood Side in 2014 on Bellowhead’s album Revival and on their 2015 farewell tour of which a recording was released in 2016 on their CD+DVD The Farewell Tour. Boden noted on the 2014 album:

This is a version of The Cruel Mother (an English ballad from the seventeenth century) which was learnt from Hull based singer Jim Eldon. Also known as The Lady of York it tells a devastating but not uncommon story of a nobleman’s daughter going to terrible lengths to preserve her good name. Shamed by giving birth out of wedlock, she kills her two sons and buries them in the woods. As is often the case with murder ballads there is a sting in the tale in that they return to haunt her.

The Unusual Suspects sang Fine Floo’ers on their 2010 live CD Big Like This that was recorded in the same year at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall.

Bryony Griffith sang The Lady of York on her and Will Hampson’s 2011 CD Lady Diamond. They learned it from the singing of Jim Eldon on the Yorkshire Garland website.

German trio More Maids sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in 2011 on their CD III. They noted:

There are many very old traditional songs on the shocking subject of child murder. It seems that these tragedies have always been part of womankind and in this song of Scottish origin, a mother who murders her newborn baby later encounters the baby’s ghost.

The Owl Service sang Cruel Mother on their 2011 album The Pattern Beneath the Plough.

The Spiers Family sang Fine Flowers in the Valley in ca 2012 on their album Plenty Brass and a Bonny Lass. They noted:

Emma [Spiers] sings this hauntingly beautiful variant of The Cruel Mother, a tale of infanticide with a supernatural twist. This version was originally published in Johnson’s Scots Musical Museum.

Steve Roud printed The Cruel Mother in 2012 in The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs. Lucy Ward sang it a year later on the accompanying Fellside CD The Liberty to Choose.

Kim Lowings & the Greenwood sang The Cruel Mother on their 2013 EP Deepest, Darkest Night.

Hannah Sanders sang The Cruel Mother in 2013 on her download EP Warning Bells. She noted:

Here is another Child Ballad (20), and a supernatural murder ballad. I have sung several versions of this song for 20 years and have come to understand it with deeper resonance now I am a mother. Its stark treatment of a difficult subject (infanticide) is inscribed upon the back drop of a mother in distress, an early recognition of PPD perhaps. All in all a powerful song that is both fascinating and terrible to sing and to listen to.

Fiona Hunter sang The Cruel Mother in 2014 on her eponymous CD Fiona Hunter. She noted:

The Cruel Mother is a particularly grim tale. It was one of the first ballads taught to me by Alison McMorland. Alison is a wonderful traditional singer. I studied under her during my time at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland).

The song tells the story of a young mother who kills her newborn twins and hides their bodies in the woods. She is later visited by their ghosts. The spirits tell her that they are in heaven but for the terrible deed she has done she will face the fierce fires of hell.

Jim Malcolm sang The Cruel Mither on his 2014 album The Corncrake. He noted:

This is a genuinely disturbing song, but hey, good fast tunes in a minor key are like gold dust, so there…

Nick Wyke & Becki Driscoll sang The Cruel Mother in 2014 on their WildGoose CD A Handful of Sky. They commented in their liner notes:

This version of The Cruel Mother comes from Sydling St Nicholas in Dorset. Sung by Mrs. Case, it was collected by Hammond and Gardiner and published in Marrowbones in 1965.

Anna & Elizabeth sang Greenwood Sidey in 2015 on their eponymous album Anna & Elizabeth. They noted:

From Addie Graham, and the many generations who thought this story was important to remember.

Jenny Sturgeon sang Greenwood Side on her 2015 EP Source to Sea.

Graham Coxon sang Cruel Mother in 2015 on Earth Records’ anthology celebrating Shirley Collins, Shirley Inspired….

Gillian Frame sang Fine Flooers in the Valley in her 2016 CD Pendulum.

Alice Jones sang The Cruel Mother in 2016 on her CD Poor Strange Girl. She noted:

The theme of this song is one that is surprisingly common in folk music. There is no explanation as to what causes the lady in this tale to commit such a horrific act but one can imagine she must have found herself in a somewhat desperate situation. This version of the ballad has been heavily adapted with the words coming from a number of different sources.

Andy Turner sang The Cruel Mother as the 4 February 2017 entry of his project A Folk Song a Week. His very concise version was collected by Cecil Sharp from Mrs Eliza Woodberry of Ash Priors in Somerset. Sharp included it in his Folk Songs From Somerset, Series 4, and Maud Karpeles printed it in her 2-volume collection, The Crystal Spring, from which Andy learned the song.

Rosie Hood and Emily Portman sang The Cruel Mother in 2017 on Rosie’s RootBeat CD The Beautiful & the Actual. She noted:

Collected from Mary Bond, Quenington, by Alfred Williams [VWML AW/6/213] , published in Folk Songs of the Upper Thames, 1923. Williams described this song as a ‘fragment’ and I wrote the first two verses based on other versions of this song. This is a particularly damning version with no hint of empathy towards the mother.

This video shows Rosie at Moira Furnace Folk Festival 2016:

And Jon Wilks talked with Rosie Hood about The Cruel Mother in October 2020 in Episode 13 of his Old Songs Podcast. He sang The Cruel Mother on an August 2022 download single where he noted:

I first heard The Cruel Mother [Roud 9] when Emily Portman performed it live and unaccompanied at Whitchurch Folk Club, Hampshire. She talked of having learned it from the singing of Cecilia Costello, and that prompted me to go and have a dig around and find out more about the Birmingham Digbeth source singer.

It’s a shocking song, whichever version you find your way to. A mother falls pregnant by her father’s clerk, gives birth to two boys, murders them and then finds herself haunted by them into an eternal madness. Cecilia Costello said that her father had sung it to her during her childhood, warning her that this was to be her fate, too, if she wasn’t careful. I find it cinematic. It’s easy to sing as I can see it played out in front of me in my mind’s eye. Grizzly stuff.

I recorded this originally for Up the Cut, but found that it failed to fit with the other tracks. As I’m about to start recording a new album, I thought I’d release this delicate outtake—given a new mix by George Boomsma, a musician and producer I much admire—as a way of drawing a line under that collection of music and turning my attention to something new.

The guitar, for those that would like the tuning, is in CGCGCD. This version of The Cruel Mother very much began with that opening phrase—I wasn’t aware that I was finding my way into this particular song until some time later.

Lori Watson sang Fine Floors in the Valley as one of her 2017 monthly digital singles and on her resulting 2018 CD Yarrow Acoustic Sessions. She noted:

The fifth monthly Yarrow Acoustic Sessions single is a beautiful version of the traditional song shared with me by Anne Neilson. Anne’s interpretation of traditional song, the way she develops a personal connection with songs, stories, people, perspectives has been an important inspiration to me over the years.

Birth, death, vulnerability, violence, deep sorrow, bitterness: a newborn baby is murdered and buried, the mother is tormented. This is a Scottish variant of The Cruel Mother (Child 20). But we as humanity are responsible for this. There are several versions of the story; some published in broadsides in the late 1700s and more taking place today. The chorus lines gain weight through each verse of the song as the tragedy of the child and the mother’s situation sink in. The melody is one of the most beautiful I have ever heard.

This arrangement was created with Fiona Black. If you haven’t already, you can hear her playing with the Outside Track and various other collaborations. She writes brilliant tunes too.

Landless learned All Around the Loney-O from Mary Delaney and sang it on their 2018 CD Bleaching Bones.

Rachel Newton sang Down by the Greenwood Side on the Furrow Collective’s 2018 album Fathoms. They noted:

Rachel found this version of the Cruel Mother ballad in the book Traveller’s Joy. It was sung by Danny Brazil in Gloucester in 1978.

Lucy Ward sang Mari Fach, with her own lyrics inspired by The Cruel Mother, on her 2018 album Pretty Warnings.

Jacqui McShee sang The Bonny Greenwoodside on the 2019 Fledg’ling archive CD An Evening With John Renbourn + Jacqui McShee. No recording date or venue is given for this live performance, but it must have been years earlier, before John Renbourn’s death in 2015.

A Different Thread sang Cruel Mother on their 2020 EP Some Distant Shore.

Fay Hield sang Cruel Mother in 2020 on her Topic album Wrackline. She noted:

Often harsh in its treatment of the mother, this version shifts to envelop her with sympathy for her situation. Forgiveness comes from her ghostly babies even though she may not feel able to forgive herself.

Graeme Armstrong sang Fine Flowers in the Valley on his 2022 album You Are Free.

Angeline Morrison sang The Cruel Mother in 2022 on her album The Brown Girl and Other Folk Songs. She noted:

Also known as Greenwood Sidey or The Lady of York, this ancient tale of infanticide and haunting can be found in various forms in the UK, Ireland, Denmark, Germany and the USA. It’s one of those incredibly popular song stories that filter into children’s games. Interestingly, the ballad references ancient beliefs that the revenant spirits of unbaptised children tended to be quite malicious. The wonderful Birmingham source singer Cecilia Costello recorded a version for the BBC in 1954, complete with a spoken introduction where she describes how her father would sing this to her as a warning. As I was a-walking Mrs Costello’s lovely version, learning it to record here, this melody and all the recorder parts just swooshed into my head.

The Hack-Poets Guild sang Cruel Mother, as sung by Rosie Hensley, North Carolina in 1916, collected by Maud Karpeles and Cecil Sharp [VWML CJS2/9/2371] , on their 2023 album Blackletter Garland.

George Sansome sang The Cruel Mother on the 2023 anthology Sing Yonder 1. He noted:

For this recording, I’ve used Karl [Sinfield]’s Sing Yonder setting of the tune and words. It’s a dark, uncomfortable song that confronts mental health difficulties and tells a powerful story. My guitar is tuned CGDGAD.

Allister Thompson sang The Unfortunate Mother, set to a tune of his own, on his 2024 album Ancestors.

Anne Briggs recorded The Cruel Mother in 1971, very probably in the sessions for her Topic album Anne Briggs. This recording was finally released on Record Store Day 2024 on the 7" bonus single The Lost Tape accompanying that album’s reissue. She noted:

A harrowing tale of an illegitimate pregnancy and the birth of twin sons. The mother kills them both, then regrets it when she sees two young boys playing at ball. She tells them that if they were her children, she would dress them extravagantly. It transpires that they are her boys (come back from the future or from heaven?). They remind her that when they were hers, she gave them nothing but death. She descends into remorse and asks them what her death will be like and they spell it out graphically.

I don’t remember who I learned this song from but it’s a very chilling morality tale.

Matt Quinn sang The Cruel Mother, “from the singing of Jock Duncan via Shirley Collins”, on his 2024 download album Quinn the Roud: 1-10 in which he followed up Series 1 of his folk song podcast In the Roud with his own recordings of the Roud 1-10 songs.

See also The Male Female Highwayman on the Kipper Family’s 1984 album Since Time Immoral.

Lyrics

Sidney Gilpin’s The Sun Shines Fair on Carlisle Wall

She lean’d her head against a thorn,
    The sun shines fair on Carlisle wa’;
And there she has her young babe born,
    And the lyon shall be lord of a’.

“Smile no sae sweet, my bonnie-babe,
An ye smile sae sweet ye’ll smile me dead.”

She’s howket a grave by the light o’ the moon,
And there she’s buried her sweet babe in.

As she was going to the church
She saw a sweet babe in the porch.

“O bonnie babe, an ye were mine,
I’d clead you in silk and sabelline.”

“O mother mine, when I was thine,
To me ye were na half sae kind.

“But now I’m in the heavens hie,
And ye have the pains o’ hell to dree.”

Cecilia Costello sings The Cruel Mother

There was a lady that lived in York
    All alone and aloney-o
She proved a child be her own father’s clerk
    Down by a greenwood sidey-o

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn
She thought three times that her back would be broke

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn
She said, “Honourable Mary pity me.”

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn
There her three fine sons they were born

She pulled out her long penknife
And there she took away their three lives

Years went by and one summer’s morn
She saw three boys, they were playing bat and ball

“Oh my fine boys if you were mine
Sure I’d dress you up in silk so fine.”

“Oh mother dear when we were yours
You did not dress us in silk so fine.”

“You pulled out your long penknife
And there you took away our three lives.”

“Oh my fine boys what will become of me
You’ll be seven long years a bird in a tree.”

“You’ll be seven years more a tongue in a bell
And you’ll be seven long years a porter in hell.”

Thomas Moran sings The Cruel Mother

O your first little child with the golden locks
    All along and a-lonely-O
And you’ve buried him under your own bed stock
    Down by the greenwood sidey-O

You’ve buried three more on your way going home
And you’ve buried three more on that butting stone

Well you’ll be seven long years a wolf in the woods
And you’ll be seven long years a fish in the floods

You’ll be seven long years a-ringing the bell
And you’ll be seven long years a-burning in hell

Well I’d like very well to be a wolf in the woods
And I’d like very well to be a fish in the floods

I’d like very well to be a-ringing the bell
But the Lord may save my soul from hell

Ewan MacColl sings The Cruel Mother

A minister’s dochter in the North,
    Hey, the rose and the linsie, O.
She’s fa’en in love w i’ her faither’s clerk,
    Doon by the greenwood sidie, O.

She’s coorted him a year and a day.
Till her the young man did betray.

She leaned her back against a tree.
And then the tear did blind her e’e.

She leaned her back against a thorn.
And there twa bonnie boys has she born.

She’s ta’en the napkin frae her neck.
And made tae them a winding sheet.

She’s ta’en oot her little penknife.
And she has twined them o’ their life.

She’s laid them ’neath a marble stane,
Thinking to gang a maiden hame.

She’s looked ower her faither’s wa’,
And she’s seen they twa bonnie boys at the ba’.

“O bonnie bairns, gin ye were mine,
I would dress ye in the silk sae fine.”

“O cruel mither, when we were thine.
We didna see ocht o’ the silk sae fine.”

“O bonnie bairns, come tell toe me.
What kind o’ a deith I’ll hae to dee?”

“Sieven year a fish-in the flood,
Sieven year a bird in the wood.

“Sieven year a tongue to the warnin’ bell,
Seven year in the caves o’ hell.”

“Welcome, welcome, fish in the flood.
Welcome, welcome, bird in the wood.

“Welcome tongue o’ the warning bell.
But God keep me frae the flames o’ Hell.”

Shirley Collins sings The Cruel Mother

A minister’s daughter in the north
    Hey the rose and the lindsay-o,
She’s fallen in love with her father’s clerk,
    Down by the greenwood side-i-o.

He courted her for a year and a day,
Till her the young man did betray.

She leaned her back up against a tree
And there the tear did blind her eye.

She leaned her back up against a thorn
And that her bonny boys she has born.

She’s taken out her little pen-knife
And she has twined them of their life.

She laid them beneath some marble stone
Thinking to go a maiden home.

As she looked over her father’s wall
She saw her two bonny boys playing ball.

“Oh bonny boys, if you were mine
I would dress you in silk so fine.”

“Oh cruel mother, when we were thine
We didn’t see aught of your silk so fine.”

“Oh bonny boys, come tell to me
What sort of death I’ll have to die?”

“Seven years as a fish in the flood,
And seven years a bird in the wood.”

“Seven years a tongue in the warning bell,
And seven years in the flames of hell.”

“Welcome, welcome, fish in the flood,
And welcome, welcome, bird in the wood.”

“Welcome, tongue to the warning bell,
But God keep me from the flames of hell.”

Lucy Stewart sings Down by the Greenwood Sidie O

Oh it’s Logan’s wids, aye, an’ Logan’s braes,
Whaur I helped my bonnie lassie on wi’ her claithes,
First her hose an’ then her sheen,
She gar me the slip when I was deen.

She laid her heid against a thorn
An’ twa bonnie bairnies she has borne
An’ twa bonnie bairnies she has borne
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

She dug a hole beneath a tree
An’ she’s buried them whaur nane might see,
An’ she’s buried them whaur nane might see,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

Oh right wanly has she gaen hame,
That nane might middle wi’ her fair fame,
That Dane might middle wi’ her fair fame,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

For days an’ weeks she was pale an’ wan,
But what ailed her there’s neen might ken,
But what ailed her there’s neen might ken,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

As she lookit ower the castle wa’,
She saw twa bonnie bairnies playin’ at the ba’,
She saw twa bonnie bairnies playin’ at the ba’,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

Oh, bonnie bairnies gin ye were mine
Ye would get the white coo milk and wine
Ye would get the white coo milk and wine
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

Oh cruel mother when we were thine
Ye didna gie us the white coo milk and wine,
Ye didna gie us the white coo milk and wine,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

But you took the ribbon frae off your hair
An’ you chokit us though we grat sair,
An’ ye chokit us though we grat sair,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

An’ we two in heaven do dwell
While ye mon dreg the fierce fires o’ hell,
While ye mon dreg the fierce fires o’ hell,
Doon by the greenwood sidie-o.

A.L. Lloyd sings The Cruel Mother

She leaned herself against a thorn
    All alone and so lonely,
And there she had two pretty babies born,
    And it’s down by the greenwood side-o.

And she took off her ribbon belt,
And there she bound them hand and leg.

“Smile not so sweet, by bonny babes,
If you smile so sweet, you’ll smile me dead.”

She had a pen-knife long and sharp,
And she pressed it through their tender heart.

She digged a grave beyond the sun,
And there she’s buried the sweet babes in.

She stuck her pen-knife on the green,
And the more she rubbed, more blood was seen.

She threw the pen-knife far away,
And the further the threw the nearer it came.

As she was going by the church,
She seen two pretty babies in the porch.

As she came to her father’s hall,
She seen two pretty babes playing at ball.

“Oh babes, oh babes, if you were mine,
I’d dress you up in the scarlet fine.”

“Oh mother, oh mother, we once were thine,
You didn’t dress us in scarlet fine.”

“You took a pen-knife long and sharp,
And pressed it through our tender heart.”

“You dug a grave beyond the sun,
And buried us under a marble stone.”

“Oh babes, oh babes, what have I to do,
For the cruel thing that I did to you?”

“Seven long years a bird in the wood,
And seven long years a fish in the flood.”

“Seven long years a warning bell,
And seven long years in the deeps of hell.”

Vicki Whelan sings There Was a Lady Dressed in Green

There was a lady dressed in green
    Airy-airy aye do
There was a lady dressed in green
    Down by the river side-o

She had a baby in her arms

She had a penknife in her hand

She stuck it in her baby’s heart

There came two policemen knocking at the door

“Where were you, Mrs Green, last night?”

“Then off to prison you must go.”

Dave and Toni Arthur sing The Cruel Mother

There was a lady came from York
    All alone and a-lonely
She fell in love with her father’s clerk
    All down by the greenwood sidey

She loved him well, she loved him long
At last she proved with child by him

She leaned her back against a thorn
And there she had two pretty babes born

She drew her scarf from off her head
And bound those pretty babes hands and legs

She laid those babes across her lap
And swore they’d never suck milk nor pap

She drew their little dresses apart
And stabbed those pretty babes to the heart

She wiped her knife all on the grass
The more she wiped, the blood ran fast

She washed her hands all in a spring
Thinking to return a maid again

As she came to her father’s hall
She saw two pretty babes playing at ball

“O babes, O babes, if you were mine
I’d dress you up all in silk so fine”

They said, “O mother, when we were yours
You neither dressed us in silk nor coarse

“O you took out your little penknife
And parted us and our sweet life”

“O babes, O babes, what can I do
For the wicked crime I’ve done to you?”

“Spend seven years like an owl in the wood
And seven more like a whale in the sea

“For seven years you’ll ring a bell
The rest of time, you’ll spend in hell”

Martin Carthy sings Cruel Mother

She’s laid down all below a thorn
𝄆 And two bonnie babies she has born, 𝄇
    Down by the greenwood side-e-o

And she’s pulled the ribbons from off her hair
𝄆 And she’s choked them though they cried for air. 𝄇

And she’s dug a hole all beneath the tree
𝄆 And she’s buried them where none might see. 𝄇

O right wanly as she’d gone home
𝄆 That none might meddle wi’ her fair fame. 𝄇

For weeks and months she was wan and pale
And what ailed her there was no man could tell,
But what ailed her there’s no man could tell.

Now as she looked o’er yon castle wall
𝄆 She spied two bonny babies playing at the ball. 𝄇

“Oh bonny babies if you were mine
𝄆 I would feed you on the white cow’s milk and wine” 𝄇

“Oh cruel mother when we were thine,
𝄆 Oh, we got none of your white cow’s milk and wine.” 𝄇

“But you pulled the ribbons from off your hair
𝄆 And you choked us though we cried for air.” 𝄇

“And we now two in heaven do dwell
𝄆 Whilst ye must drag out the fierce fires of hell.” 𝄇

Barbara Dickson sings Fine Flowers in the Valley

She sat down below a thorn,
    Fine flowers in the valley,
And there she’s cast her babe newborn,
    And the green leaves they grow rarely.

“Smile na sae sweet, my bonnie babe,
An ye’ll smile sae sweet, ye will smile me deid.”

She’s ta’en oot her wee pen knife
And twined the sweet babe o’ it’s life.

She’s howket a grave by the licht o’ the moon
An’ there she’s buried her sweet babe in.

As she was going to the church
She saw a sweet babe in the porch.

“O sweet babe, an’ thou wert mine,
I wad cleed thee in the silk sae fine.”

“O cruel mother, when I was thine,
Ye didna prove tae me sae kind.”

Linda Adams sings The Sun Shines Fair on Carlisle Wall

There lived a lady in the North,
    The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall;
And she had a child by her father’s clerk,
    And the lion shall be lord of all.

She leaned her back against a thorn,
And there she has her young babe born

“Smile not so sweet, my bonny babe,
For you smile so sweet you’ll smile me dead.”

She’s howket a grave by the light of the moon,
And she’s buried her sweet babe in.

As she was going to the church
She spied a sweet babe in the porch.

“O bonny babe, if you were mine,
I’d clad you in silk and sabelline.”

“O mother mine, when I was thine,
To me you were not half so kind.

“But now I’m in the heavens high,
And you have the pains of hell to die.”

Danny Brazil sings Down by the Greenwood Side

As she was a-walking her father’s walk, i-o,
As she was a-walking her father’s walk,
She saw two pretty babies playing the ball.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She said, “Pretty babes, if you was mine, i-o,”
She said, “Pretty babes, if you was mine,
I’d dress you in such silken fine.”
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

They said, “Dear mother, when we was yours, i-o,
You took a penknife long and sharp
And pierced we two pretty babes to the heart.”
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She washed the penknife in the stream, i-o,
She washed the penknife in the stream;
The more she washed it the blood stained in.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downwards,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She leant her back up against the oak, i-o,
She leant her back up against the oak,
First it bent and then it broke.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downwards,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

Jim Eldon sings The Lady of York

There was a lady, a lady of York,
    Ri-fol-i-diddle-i-gee-wo.
She fell a-courting in her own father’s park,
    Down by the greenwood side-o.

She leaned her back up against a thorn,
And there she had two pretty babies born.

But she had nothing for to lap ’em in,
But she had a penknife sharp and keen.

And she didn’t care how much it hurt,
There she stabbed them right through the heart.

She wiped her penknife in the sludge,
And the more she wiped it the more blood showed.

As she was a-walking in her own father’s park,
She saw two pretty babies playing with a ball.

Pretty babes, pretty babes, if’n you was mine,
I’d dress you up in silks so fine.

Dear mother, dear mother, when we was thine,
You didn’t have time to dress us up fine.

But now we’re away to the heavens so high,
But you, you’ll go to the bad when you die.
    Down by the greenwood side-o.     (spoken) So she did.

Steeleye Span sing The Cruel Mother

There was a lady lived in York,
She stabbed her baby to the heart.
She drew a scarf from off her head,
She bound the baby’s hands and legs.

She drew a knife long and sharp,
She stabbed the baby to the heart.
She wiped the knife upon the grass,
The more she wiped, the blood ran fast.

As she was going to her father’s hall,
She saw three children playing at ball.
One in silk, the other in satin,
The other was naked as ever was born.

“Oh, dear child, if you were mine,
I’d dress you in silk and satins so fine.”
“Mother dear, I once was thine,
You never would dress me, coarse or fine.”

“Mother, mother, for your sins
Heaven you shall not enter.
There is fire beyond Hell’s gate
And there you’ll burn forever.”

Old Blind Dogs sing The Rose and the Lindsey O

There was a lady in the North,
    Hey wi’ the rose and the Lindsey O
And she’s fa’an in love wi’ her faither’s clerk,
    Doon by the Greenwood sidey O

She’s coorted him for a year and a day
’Til it’s her great belly did her betray.

She’s leaned her back against a tree
Thinkin’ that she micht lichter be.

And she’s leaned her back against a thorn
And it’s bonnie was the boys she’ born.

But she’s ta’en oot her wee penknife
And she’s pit an end tae their sweet lives.

She’s buried them ’neath a marble stane
Thinkin’ tae gang a maiden hame.

She’s lookit ower her faither’s wa’
And she’s seen thae twa bonnie boys playin’ at the ba’.

“Oh bonnie bairns gin ye were mine
I wad dress ye up in the silk sae fine.”

“Oh cruel mither when we were thine
We nivver saw ocht o’ the silk sae fine.”

“Oh bonnie bairns come tell tae me
Fit kind o’ a death I’ll hae tae dee.”

“Seven years a bird in the wood
Aye an’ seven years a fish in the flood.

“Seven years a turn tae the warnin’ bell
Aye but seven years in the caves o’ hell.”

Welcome welcome bird in the wood
Aye and welcome welcome fish in the flood.

Aye an’ welcome turn tae the warnin bell
But God keep me oot o’ the flames o’ hell.

Jock Duncan sings The Cruel Mother

A maiden was coorted seiven years an a day,
    Hey tae the rose and the lindie O,
Until her beau did her betray,
    Doun by the greenwood sidey O.

She leaned her back against a wa,
And bore him bonnie bairnies twa.

Then she took oot a wicked knife,
And dang awa their precious life.

Oh she beeried them ’neath a marble stane,
And then went hame a maiden again.

Ae nicht she looked ower her castle wa,
And saw twa bonnie boys at the ba.

“Oh bonnie bairnies gin ye were mine,
I wad feed ye on fine cakes an wine.

“And I’d lat ye drink the ferra coo’s milk,
And dress ye in fine satin an silk.”

“Oh cruel, cruel mither when we were thine,
We didna feed on cakes an wine.

“Nor did we drink on the ferra coo’s milk,
Nor did we dress in satin an silk.

“For you took oot a wicked knife,
And you dang awa oor precious life.”

“Oh bonnie bairnies ye’ll tell tae me,
Fit kin o pain for ye I mith dree.”

“Cruel, cruel mither we’ll tell tae ye,
Fit kin o pain for us ye maun dree.”

“It’s seiven lang years a fowl in the woods,
An seiven lang years a fish in the floods.”

“Then it’s seiven lang years a tongue to the bell,
And the rest o the time in the flames o Hell.”

Sandra Kerr, Nancy Kerr and James Fagan sing The Cruel Mother

There was a lady lived in York,
    All alone and aloney,
She fell in love with her father’s clerk,
    Down by the greenwood sidey.

She leaned her back against an oak
But first it bent and then it broke.

She learned her back against a thorn
And there she had two babies born.

She took a penknife long and sharp
And stabbed those babies to the heart.

She buried them under a marble stone
And then she went as a maiden home.

She passed by her father’s hall,
She saw two babies playing at ball.

“Babes o babes if you were mine
I’d dress you up in silks so fine.”

“Mother o mother we once were thine,
You neither dressed us coarse nor fine.”

“Babes o babes it’s heaven for you.”
“Mother o mother it’s hell for you.”

Elspeth Cowie sings Cruel Mither

She’s leaned her back against an oak
    All alone and alonie o
She’s pushed an’ she’s pushed till her back’s near broke
    Doon by the bonnie greenwoodsidie o

She’s leaned her head against a thorn
The two bonniest babes that ever were born

She’s gone back tae her father’s castle ha’
She was the sma’est maid o’ them a’

As she looked over her father’s castle wall
She saw two babes playin’ wi’ their ball

O dear babes, gin ye were mine
I’d gie ye bread an’ I’d gie ye wine

A cruel mither when we were thine
Around our necks you pulled the twine

We are in a heaven so fine
And in Hell’s fire you will burn

macAlias sing Fine Floo’ers in the Valley / Bonny at Morn

She sat doon below a thorn
    Fine floo’ers in the valley
And it’s there she has her sweet babe born
    And the green leaves they grow rarely

Smile na sae sweet my bonnie babe
    Fine floo’ers in the valley
And ye’ll smile sae sweet ye’ll smile me deid
    And the green leaves they grow rarely

She’s taen oot her wee penknife
And she’s twined the sweet babe o’ it’s life

She’s howkit a grave by the light o’ the moon
And it’s there she’s buried her sweet babe in

And the sheep are in the meadow and the kye are in the corn
Thou’s ower lang in thy bed, bonnie at morn
Canny at neet, bonnie at morn
Thou’s ower lang in thy bed, bonnie at morn

As she was going tae the church
She spied a sweet babe on the porch

Oh bonnie babe gin thou wert mine
I’d busk ye in the silk sae fine

Ah, mother dear when I wert thine
You never treated me sae kind

And the sheep are in the meadow and the kye are in the corn
Thou’s ower lang in thy bed, bonnie at morn
Canny at neet, bonnie at morn
Thou’s ower lang in thy bed, bonnie at morn

Emily Smith sings The Cruel Mother

In Logan’s woods, aye in Logan’s braes
I helped ma bonnie lassie on wi’ her claithes
First her hoes and then her shune
She gart me the slip when she was done

She’s leaned her back against a thorn
And there she has twa bonnie babes born
There she has twa bonnie babes born
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

She’s dug a hole baith lang and deep
And buried them where nane might see
She’s buried them where nane might see
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

She’s ta’en a ribbon frae aff her hair
An’ she’s chokit them though they grat sair
She’s chokit them though they grat sair
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

Richt wanley has she gaed hame
Sae nane might meddle wi’ her fair fame
Sae nane might meddle wi’ her fair fame
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

For days an’ weeks she was pale an’ wan
What she thoucht o’ there’s nane could tell
What she thoucht o’ there’s nane could tell
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

As she was lookin’ o’er yon castle wa’
She saw twa bonnie bairnies playin’ at a ba’
She saw twa bonnie bairnies playin at a ba’
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

Oh bairns, bairns, gin ye were mine
I’d gie ye coo’s milk, I’d gie ye reid wine
I’d gie ye coo’s milk and reid wine
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

Oh mother, mother we once were thine
Ye didna gie us coo’s milk or reid wine
Ye didna gie us coo’s milk or reid wine
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

You took a ribbon frae aff yer hair
An’ ye chokit us though we grat sair
Ye chokit us though we grat sair
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

Oh bairns, bairns come tell me true
What the future holds for you
What the future holds for you
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

Oh mother, cruel mother we ken richt weel
Tis we in heaven, in heaven must dwell
While ye maun dreg the fierce fires o’ hell
Doon by the greenwood sidie o

June Tabor sings The Cruel Mother

There was a lady near the town,
    Low so low and so lonely,
She walked all night and all around,
    Down in the greenwoods of ivy.

She’s leaned her back against a thorn;
Two little babies she has borne.

She took a rope so long and neat,
She tied them down both hand and feet.

She took a knife so keen and sharp,
She pierced it through each tender heart.

She buried them under the marble stone,
Then she turned and went on home.

As she walked out one moonlit night,
She saw two babes all dressed in white.

“Oh babes, oh babes, if you were mine,
I’d dress you up in silks so fine.”

“Oh mother, oh mother, when we were yours,
You dressed us in our own hearts’ blood.”

“You wiped your pen-knife on your shoe,
The more you wiped the bloodier it grew.”

“You buried us under the marble stone,
You turned and went a maiden home.”

“Babes, oh babes, come tell me true,
What death must I die for you?”

“For seven years you shall ring the bell,
For seven years you shall wait in hell.”

Stanley Robertson sings She’s Leaned Her Back

She’s leaned her back against an ake,
    All alone an aloney-o,
She’s pushed an pushed until her back did break,
    Doon by the bonnie greenwood sidey-o.

She’s leaned her back against a thorn
Twa bonnie bairnies has she born

An she has howkit oot a graue
An she has placed her new-born babes

An she’s gaed back tae her father’s castle ha
She was the fairest o them a

An she’s lookit ower the high castle wa
She sa twa bairnies play in wi a ba

Oh, bonnie bairnies, wert thou mine
I’d cled ye in the silk sae fine

Bonnie bairnies, wert thou mine
I’d gie ye breid an I’d gie ye wine

Oh, cruel mither, when we were thine
Aroon oor necks she pu’d a twine

But noo we are in the heaven sic high
An in hell’s fire ye will surely die

Chris Foster sings The Cruel Mother

There was a lady, a lady in York
    All alone and aloney-o
She fell a-courting her own father’s clerk
    Down by the greenwood sidey-o

She loved him long and many a day
’Til big with child she had to run away

She’s gone into the wild wilderness
Great was her sadness and distress

She’s leaned her back against an oak
She’s pushed and she’s pushed ’till it very nearly broke

She’s laid her head against a thorn
Two bonniest babies ever were born

She’s got nothing to wrap them in
Nothing but her apron and that was very thin

She’s taken out her little penknife
And she’s parted them from their sweet lives

Then she has taken a length of twine
And together their bodies she did bind

Then she has dug a hole in the ground
And there she’s laid her bonnie babies down

She’s gone back to her father’s castle hall
She was the smallest maid among ’em all

She’s looked over her father’s castle wall
Saw two bonnie babies playing with a ball

One was dressed in the scarlet so fine
The other one was naked just as she was born

“Oh dear babies, if you were mine
I would give you bread and I would give you wine”

“Oh dear Mother, when we were thine
You never treated us so very kind”

“Oh dear babies if you were mine
I’d dress you up in the silk and satin fine”

“Oh dear Mother, when we were thine
Around our bodies you bound the twine”

“O bonnie babes can you tell to me
What sort of death for you I must die?”

“Yes cruel mother we will tell to thee
what sort of death for us you must die”

“Seven years you’ll be an eel writhing in the flood
And seven years a bird a whistling in the wood”

“Seven years you’ll be a fish finning through the tide
And seven years a snake on your belly you must slide”

“Now we are going to the heavens so high
But in the hell fires you will die.”

Brian Peters sings All Alone and Lonely

There was a lady lived in York
    All alone and lonely,
She fell in love with her father’s clerk
    Down by the greenwood side.

She loved him well, she loved him long,
She grew with child as the year drew on.

She leaned her back against an oak,
First it bowed and then it broke.

She leaned her back against a thorn
And there her two bonny babes were born.

She took a penknife, long and sharp,
She pierced it through their tender hearts.

She dug a hole, both wide and deep,
She threw them in and bid them sleep.

he wiped the knife all on the grass,
The more she wiped, the blood ran fast.

She washed her hands all in the spring,
Thought to return a maid again.

But as she returned to her father’s hall
She spied two babes a-playing at the ball.

“Oh babes, oh babes, if you were mine,
I’d dress you up in the silk so fine.”

“Oh mother dear, we once were thine,
But you didn’t dress us in the silk so fine.

“For you took a penknife long and sharp,
You pierced it through our tender hearts.”

“Oh babes, oh babes, what must I do
For this cruel deed I have done to you?”

“It’s seven years to wash and wring,
Seven years to card and spin.

“Seven years as an owl in the wood,
Seven years as a fish in the flood.

“And seven years to toll the bell,
Seven years in the flames of Hell.”

Bryony Griffith sings The Lady of York

There was a lady, a lady of York,
    Ri-fol-i-diddle-i-gee-o.
And she fell a-courting all in her father’s park,
    Down by the greenwood side-o.

She has leaned her back up against a thorn,
And there she has had two pretty babies born.

But she had nothing for to lap them in,
But she had a penknife sharp and keen.

And she didn’t care how much it hurt,
There she had stabbed them both through the heart.

She has wiped her penknife all in the sludge,
But the more she has wiped the more blood has flowed.

Now as she was a-walking in her own father’s hall,
She espied two pretty bairns playing at the ball.

“Pretty bairns, pretty bairns, if’n you were mine,
I would wrap you up in silks so fine.”

“Dear mother, dear mother, when we were thine,
You didn’t have the time to wrap us up so fine.

But now we’re away to the heavens so high,
And you, you will go to the bad when you die.”

The Spiers Family sings Fine Flowers in the Valley

She sat doon below a thorn
    Fine floo’ers in the valley
And there she has her sweet babe borne
    And the green leaves they grow rarely

“Smile nae sae sweet, my bonnie babe.”
“An ye smile sae sweet, ye’ll smile me deid.”

She’s ta’en oot her wee penknife
And twined the sweet babe o its life.

She’s howkit a grave by the licht o the moon
And there she’s buried her sweet babe in.

As she was goin tae the Church
She saw a sweet babe in the porch.

“O bonnie babe, an thou wert mine
O I wid clad thee in silk sae fine.”

“O mither dear, when I was thine
You didnae prove tae me sae kind.”

Bellowhead sing Greenwood Side

There was a lady, a lady of York,
Low down in the valley,
And she fell courting in her father’s park,
Down by the greenwood side.

She leant her back up against a thorn,
Low down in the valley,
And there she had two pretty babies born,
Down by the greenwood side.

But she had nothing to wrap them in,
No silks of gold no gown of green.
But she had a penknife sharp and keen,
Down by the greenwood side.

And she didn’t care how much it hurt,
Low down in the valley,
She stabbed them there right through the heart,
Down by the greenwood side.

She wiped her penknife all in the sludge,
Low down in the valley,
And the more she wiped it the more blood showed,
Down by the greenwood side.

As she was walking in her father’s hall
Where the long grass grows by an old stone wall,
She spied two pretty babies playing at ball,
Down by the greenwood side.

“Oh pretty babies ifyou were mine,
Low down in the valley,
I’d dress you up in silks so fine,
Down by the greenwood side, the greenwood side.”

“Dear mother, dear mother, when we were thine,
Low down in the valley,
Oh you didn’t have time to dress us up fine,
Down by the greenwood side, the greenwood side.

“And now we two in heaven dwell,
Low down in the valley,
While you must burn in the fires of Hell,
Down by the greenwood side.

Gillian Frame sings Fine Flooers in the Valley

She lay doon below a thorn
    Fine flooers in the valley
And there she has her sweet babe born
    And the green leaves they grow rarely

Smile nae sae sweet, my ain bonnie babe
Ye smile sae sweet, ye’ll smile me deid

She’s taen out her wee penknife
And twined the sweet babe o’ its life

She’s howket a grave by the light o’ the moon
And there she’s buried her sweet babe in

As she was going to the church
She spied a bonnie babe in the porch

O sweet babe and thou were mine
It’s I’d clad thee in the silk so fine

O mother dear, when I was thine
You did na prove to me sae kind

Rosie Hood sings The Cruel Mother

There was a lady in our town
    Jenny poor gentle Rosemary
She courted a man til her apron grew round
    When the dew lies under the mulberry tree

She leaned her back against a thorn
And there two little babies were born.

She laid these babies across her lap,
She swore they should never suck milk nor pap.

She tore their little dresses apart,
She stabbed the babies to the heart.

She bore her babies to the brook,
She vowed she would bury them down in the deep.

She let her penknife into the brook,
She thought that the blood had never forsook.

She went to the brook to wash her hands,
The more that the washed the more it came on.

“Oh babes, oh babes, when you were mine
Your were dressed in silks and satins so fine.”

“Oh mother, oh mother, when we were thine
We never were dressed in silks to fine.

“Oh heaven it is a sweet pretty place
It’s where thy body shall never take ease.

“Oh hell it is a fiery place
It’s where thy body shall burn in a blaze.”

Lori Watson sings Fine Floors in the Valley

She sat doon alow a thorn
    Fine floors in the valley
An there she has her sweet babe borne
    An the green leaves they grow rarely

Smile nae sae sweet, ma bonnie babe
An ye smile sae sweet, ye’ll smile me deid

She’s ta’en oot her little penknife
An twinned the sweet babe o its life

She’s howket a grave by the light o the moon
An there she’s buried her sweet babe in

As she was gaun tae the kirk
She saw a bonnie bairn playin in the dirt

O bonnie bairn, an thou wert mine
I wad cleeth thee in silk sae fine

O mither dear, when I was thine
You didna prove tae me sae kind

Rachel Newton sings Down by the Greenwood Side

As she was walking her father’s walk, i-o,
As she was walking her father’s walk,
She saw two pretty babes playing the ball.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She said, “Pretty babes, if you was mine, i-o,”
She said, “Pretty babes, if you was mine,
I’d dress you in such silken fine.”
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

They said, “Dear mother, when we was yours, i-o,
You took a penknife long and sharp
And pierced we two pretty babes through the heart.”
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downward,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She washed the penknife in the stream, i-o,
She washed the penknife in the stream;
The more she washed it the blood stained in.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downwards,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

She leant her back up against an oak, i-o,
She leant her back up against an oak,
First it bent and then it broke.
Lay me down, me dilly, dilly downwards,
Down by the greenwood side, o.

Fay Hield sings Cruel Mother

She leaned her back against an oak,
First it bent and then it broke.
She leaned her back against a thorn
And there she has two bonny babes born.

“Smile not, smile not my bonny babes,
Smile not so sweet you’ll smile me to my grave.”
She took a knife both long and sharp
And pressed it to their tender hearts.

Chorus (after each verse):
And the streams they flow so clear.

She pulled her gown up o’er her head,
She wrapped them fine as they lay dead.
She dug a grave beyond the sun
And buried them deep neath marble stone
For the lords to walk upon.

She walked the woods on a moonlit night,
She saw two babes all dressed in white.
She walked the halls both wan and pale,
“What ailed our lady, there’s no man could tell?”

“Oh babes, oh babes if you were mine
I’d dress you up in silks so fine,
I’d lay you soft in beds of down
And watch you noon, falling dusk and dawn.

“Oh bonny babes come tell me true
What death I’ll die for the sake of you?”
“Oh mother dear don’t torment thee
Thy sin is lesser than the loss of we.”

“Oh welcome welcome to be fowl in the wood,
It’s welcome welcome, fish all in the flood.
I long to be the tongue of a warning bell
But Heaven keep me from the gates of Hell,
Oh bonny babes save me from the flames of Hell.”

Angeline Morrison sings The Cruel Mother

There was a lady that lived in York
    All alone and a-lonely,
She proved a child by her own father’s clerk
    Down by a greenwood sidey.

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn,
She thought three times that her back would be broke.

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn,
She cried, “Honourable Mary, pity me.”

As she was a-walking down her father’s lawn,
It’s there her three fine sons they were born.

And she’s taken out her long penknife,
And there she took away their three lives.

Years went by, and one fine morn,
She saw three boys, they were playing bat and ball.

“O my fine boys, if you were mine,
I’d dress you all in the silk so fine.”

“O cruel mother, when we were thine,
You did not dress us in silk so fine.

“But you took out your long penknife,
And there you took away our three lives.”

“O my fine boys, what will become of me?”
“You’ll be seven long years a bird in a tree.

“You’ll be seven years more a tonging the bell,
And you’ll be seven years more a porter in hell.”