Here are grouped songs whose main theme is love, subdivided as below. Many are hardly “popular” in the strict sense: though current among the folk, they differ from the true folk-song, or “song-ballet.” On the other hand, many bear a striking resemblance to certain of those listed in I and II, above.

1. SONGS OF CONSTANT LOVE.

AVONIA (RED RIVER VALLEY), ii, 4a3b4c3b and 4a3b4c3b, 4: A constant lover’s song of farewell to Helen, as she leaves the vale of Avonia.

BARNEY AND KATE, 4abab, 6: Barney, maudlin with drink, comes one winter’s night to Kate’s window and implores her to admit him. She sends him packing. He goes away whistling, rejoicing in her chastity.

KITTY WELLS, 4ababcdcd and 3abab, 3. Her lover’s Lament upon her death. The refrain is:

While the birds they were singing in the morning,
And the ivy and the myrtle were in bloom,
The sun on the hill-top was dawning,
It was then we laid her in the tomb.

NORA O’NEIL, 4a3b4a3b, 5: Her lover’s invitation to Nora to meet him “at the foot of the lane” when the nightingale sings in the dusk.

SWEET BIRDS, ii, 4a3b4a3b and 5aa, 6: A maiden’s song of longing for her absent lover: she asks the birds to bear her message of devotion to him and to bring him back secure in his affection for her.

[CONSTANT JOHNNY], 4aa, 14: A maiden sings her devotion to her absent sailor lover. He returns and they are married.

LORLA, 4aabb, 2: A lover’s elegy over the grave of Lorla beneath the elm, as he recalls the golden willow under which they once sat on violet banks.

LONESOME DOVE, 4a3b4c3b, 5: A constant husband sings his resolve to return like a lonesome dove to his wife and children in “Californy.”

LONESOME DOVE, 4aabb, 8: The singing of a dove bereft of its mate reminds a constant husband of his Mary, recently dead of consumption.

PRETTY SARO, iii, 4aabb and 4aabb, 6ca: Her absent lover sings of his devotion, wishing he were a priest and knew how to write to her, or a dove to fly to her.

COME, ALL YE JOLLY BOATSMAN BOYS, 7aabb, 5: A ribald song of a sailor to his amorata by night, and the birth of the child nine months later.

A PACKAGE OF OLD LETTERS, ii, 8aa, 11: A dying maiden bids her sister bring them from their rosewood casket to read them to her again, and asks that at her death they be buried with her.

JACK AND MAMIE, 6aabb and 4aaa3a, 4: Jack plunges into the water to recover the hat of his girl sweetheart, Mamie. Jack, the man, leaves her for a long voyage, and his ship never returned.

SWEET SUMMER EVENING, 4abcb, 7: The poet one summer evening overhears a mother chide her daughter for her devotion to her roving sailor lover, who soon appears and bids her an affectionate farewell.

WAIT FOR THE WAGON, 3abcbdefe and 4a(ter), 4: A lover’s call to Phyllis to jump into the wagon with him a-Sunday morning; he tells her of the cabin he has built for her, and wooes her to marry him.

LOVELY NANCY, 4abcb, 5: A dialogue, in quatrains, between Nancy and her lover, whom she wishes to accompany on his voyage to the West Indies.

NANCY TILL, 4aabb and 4aabb, 4: A serenade by her lover “down in the canebrakes close by the mill,” urging her to be ready to go with him “a-sailing on the Ohio.”

[EPHRIAM AND LUCY], 4a3b4c3b and 4a3b4c3b, 4: The night before their wedding-day, amid night-hawks, owls, and whippoorwills, “we danced by the light of the moon.”

2. SONGS OF LOVE INCONSTANT.

[SHE WAS HAPPY TILL SHE MET YOU], 4aa5b4cc5b4dd5e4ff5e and 4ababcc5b, 2: A husband forsakes his wife; later, becoming repentant, he returns to seek her at the house of her mother, who forbids him access to her.

[BEDROOM WINDOW], 4abcb, 5: The lover by night calls his sweetheart to awake. She warns him away, saying that her father is armed to repulse his presence. He vows to have her for his own. A suggestion of his sinister motive closes the song.

I’LL HANG MY HARP ON A WILLOW TREE, ii, 4a3b4a3b4c3d4c3d, 3: A lover voices his resolve to forsake the charms of his fickle mistress to court a warrior’s fate at the Saracen’s hand on the field of Palestine.

THERE WAS A RICH OLD FARMER, ii, 3abcb, 9ca: The singer recites his farewell to father and sweetheart to seek his fortune, and his faith in her until a letter arrives telling of her marriage to another man.

JACK AND JOE, 4a3b4b3c and 4a3b4b3c, 3ca: Both are sailors, away from home. Jack, returning first, is commissioned by Joe to kiss his sweetheart Nellie for him. When Joe returns, like Miles Standish, he finds that Jack and she are married.

ALL ON THE BANKS OF CLAUDA, 3abcb, 10: By this stream the poet overhears a maiden’s complaint against her fickle Johnny. Like Oenone, she prays the mountain to hear her, and implores Cupid to fire his heart anew.

THE AUXVILLE LOVE, 4aabb, 6: A merchant’s daughter, “in Auxville town or Delaware,” love-lorn, gathers flowers, Ophelia-like, and dies under a green pine on the mountain.

CUCKOO, ii, 4aabb, 5ca: A love-lorn maiden’s warning to her sex not to be deceived, as she, by false men in springtime when the cuckoo calls.

WE HAVE MET AND WE HAVE PARTED, ii, 4abcb and 4abcb, 5ca: A maiden’s scornful farewell to her fickle lover, as she returns him the presents and letters he has sent her.

IF I HAD MINDED MAMMA, 3abcb and 3abcb, 6: A maiden’s regret that she has been deluded by a faithless lover:

He is like the blue-birds ever
That flies from tree to tree;
And when he sees another girl
He never thinks of me.

I USED TO LOVE, 4abcb and 4abcb, 4: A maiden voices her complaint against the “dark-eyed girl,” her successful rival, and her wish for “coffin, shroud, and grave,” to end her woe.

THE BUTCHER’S BOY, iii, 4aabb, 8ca: A maiden voices her complaint against the New York butcher’s boy, once her childhood playmate and lover, who now has forsaken her for a wealthier girl; then goes upstairs and hangs herself, leaving a note pinned on her breast.

THE PALE AMARANTHUS, 4aabb, 5: A maiden’s complaint against her faithless lover, whom she vows to forget.

I HAVE FINISHED HIM A LETTER, 4abcb and 4abcb, 7: A maiden’s complaint against her lover, who has forsaken her for Annie Lee.

CAN YOU THEN LOVE ANOTHER?, ii, 3abcbdefe and 3abcb, 3: A lorn maiden’s plaint:

Say, must I be forgotten,
Cast like a flower aside?
Have I from memory faded,
Once all your joy and pride?

TO CHEER THE HEART, ii, 3abcbdefe and 3abcbdede, 4: A maiden’s complaint against her faithless lover. He is the son of a “rich merchant,” she, the daughter of a “laboring man.” “But why need I care? For I have another man.”

A POOR STRANGE GIRL, 4aabb, 7: The poet one May morning overhears a damsel complaining against her faithless lover, and against her loss of friends and home.

PRETTY POLLY, 4aabb, 5: A lover recites his visit one evening to her home, where he sees his rivals enjoying her company. He retires to a grove, sucks comfort from his whiskey bottle, and wishes that she were drowned, floating on the tide, that he, like a fisherman, might draw her in his net to shore.

HANG DOWN YOUR HEAD AND CRY, 4aabb, 2: A fragment (two quatrains), apparently a complaint of a lover to his faithless sweetheart.

THE DYING GIRL’S MESSAGE, ii, 4abcb, 15: Her death-song to her mother, breathing forgiveness for her faithless lover, and closing with a vision of Christ waiting to receive her.

A second version contains only an elaboration of this last motif.

THE COLD, DARK SCENES OF WINTER, 3abcb, 9: In the winter the lover woos his fair, but is rejected. In the spring, her mind changing, she writes him of her love for him. He replies that meanwhile his heart has changed in turn and that he is already married to another.

LOVING HANNER, 3abcb, 9: The lover sings his devotion to her, but in the face of her coolness and her parents’ opposition, vows to go on a long voyage to try to forget her but in vain.

MY BONNIE LITTLE GIRL, 4a3b4c3b, 4: Courting her too slow, the singer finds his sweetheart has fled with another man.

LOVELY NANCY, ii, 4aabb, 5ca: A bachelor’s warning against “courting too slow”: Sweet William goes on a voyage; meanwhile Nancy, his sweetheart, writes him of her marriage to another. William dies of grief and Nancy, of remorse.

I’M SCORNED FOR BEING POOR (VAIN GIRL), 3abcb, 8: A lover’s farewell to his sweetheart, who has forsaken him to be married to a wealthy stranger from New England.

LITTLE NELLIE, 4a3b4c3b, 8: She forsakes her lover, the singer, to marry wicked, wealthy Mr. Brown, who is a drunkard and dies of a broken heart.

THE SQUIRE, 2abcb, 10: The wealthy young squire, being rejected in love by pretty Sally, vows to dance on her grave when she dies.

LITTLE SPARROW (A REGRET), ii, 4abcb, 5ca: A complaint of a love-lorn maiden warning her kind against the faithlessness of all men.

THE AWFUL WEDDING, 4abcb, 7: At the marriage feast each guest is asked for a song. The bride’s former lover sings his unchanging affection for her. She swoons and spends the night in her mother’s bed, where she is found dead the next morning.

THE YOUNG MAN’S LOVE, 2aa, 9: The singer one evening overhears a young man lamenting the faithlessness of his sweetheart, who scorns him for his poverty.

[MAGGIE], 3a3b4c3b and 2abab (approximately), 7: A story of Maggie, the constant wife, who seeks in bar-room and dry-goods store her faithless husband, who has eloped with Lula Fry. Failing to find him, she wanders to the cemetery, and thence to the railroad trestle, where she is killed by train No. Four.

JOE HARDY, 4a3b4c3b, 6: A maiden’s explanation to her jilted lover that when she plighted her troth in Bangor, she had not then met Joe Hardy, whom she now adores.

3. SONGS OF LOVE THWARTED.

LOVELY JULIA, iv, 4abcb, 9ca: Crossed in love by her parents, she leaves the city, goes upon a mountain, and plunges a dagger into her breast. Her lover finds her and in like manner dies with her.

JOHNNY DOYLE, 2aa, 14ca: A maiden, who loves Johnny, is forced by her parents to prepare to marry Samuel Moore. Just as the priest enters, her earrings fall to the floor and her stay-laces burst. She is carried home fatally ill. The mother now proposes to send for Johnny Doyle, but it is too late she is dead.

ANNIE WILLOW, iii, 4a3b4c3b, 8: Her lover dreams of her and goes to her uncle’s house to visit her. Upon being told that she is absent, he fights his way in with drawn sword and takes her away with him.

GREENBRIAR SHORE, 4aa, 10: An amorous youth recites his love for Nancy on Greenbriar Shore. Her father chases him away with an “army of a thousand or more.” The sad lot of womankind deplored.

4. SONGS OF ABSENT LOVERS REUNITED.

THE SINGLE SOLDIER (THE SAILOR LOVER, JOHN RILEY), v, 4abcb, 8ca: “A pretty fair damsel in a garden” is wooed by a passing soldier (or sailor). She rejects him, saying her lover is absent in the wars. Assured of her faithfulness, he proves his identity by taking their betrothal ring from his pocket.

ANNIE AND WILLIE, 4a3b4c3b, 7: He bids her farewell at the seashore and goes on a long voyage. After three years he returns, and, disguised as a beggar, tests her devotion, draws the “patch from his eye,” is recognized, and marries her. (Cf. The Bailiff’s Daughter of Islington, page 8, above.)

PRETTY POLLY, 4aabb, 8: Pining for her soldier lover, who is absent in the “town of renown,” she goes in the guise of a trooper to seek him, becomes his room-mate for the night, and discloses her identity in the morning.

5. SONGS OF THE MURDEROUS LOVER. (CF. I FOR SIMILAR BALLADS.)

FLORELLA (FLOELLA, FAIR ELLA, JEALOUS LOVER), iv, 3abcb, 11ca: Her lover comes one moonlit night to her cottage window and persuades her to wander with him “through meadows dark and gay.” She reluctantly follows, and is murdered by him, forgiving him with her dying breath.

LITTLE OMY WISE (LITTLE ANNA), iii, 4aa, 13: John Lewis seduces her with promises, lures her to Adam’s Spring, murders her, and throws her body into the stream. She is “missen,” the body is found, the murderer views it and confesses the crime.

MILLER-BOY, ii, 4a3b4c3b, 12ca: Johnny, the miller’s apprentice, falls in love with a Knoxville girl. One night the pair go walking; he murders her with a fence-stake, explains the stains on his clothes as due to nose-bleed, but is convicted. (Cf. Lizzie Wan, Child, N, and Waxford Girl, page 13.)

POLLY VAUGHN, 2abcb (approximately), 4ca: One evening dressed in white she goes walking, takes refuge from a shower under a holly bush, is mistaken for a swan by her lover, Jimmy Randal, and shot.

ROSE COLALEE (COLLEEN?), 4a3b4c3b, 2: She is murdered on the bank of a river, by her lover, who, intoxicated with Burgundy wine, is persuaded by his father’s promise of money, to slay her.

NOTE. Amid the flotsam and jetsam of popular parlor-songs everywhere current the following have come to hand. They are hardly worth preserving, even by title, save for the fact that in spite of their pseudo-literary tang they are fellow travelers by oral tradition with the true folk-songs and song-ballads.

The list is: The Old, Old Love is Growing Still; There’s a Spark of Love Still Burning; I’ll Remember You, Love, in My Prayers; The White Rose; I’ll Love Thee Always; Jack and Mary; Willie and Kate; Won’t You Ever Come Again?; Fond Affection; Will You Love Me When I’m Old?; Nell and I had Quarrels; Tell Me Why You’ve Grown so Cold?; I Want to be Somebody’s Darling; By the Gate; The Broken Engagement; Say You’ll be Mine in a Year; I Cannot be Your Sweetheart; Kiss Me Again; Just Going Down to the Gate; Darling, We have Long been Parted; Our Hands are Clasped; Only Flirting; I Loved You Better than You Knew; Mollie Darling; The Jealous Girl; The Independent Girl; Willie, Come Back; Free Again; The Hawthorn Tree; The Sailor Lad; I’ll be All Smiles Tonight; Love, I’ve been Faithful; Maggie’s Secret; I Rather Think I Will; Little Sweetheart; Meet Me in the Moonlight; He’s Got Money, Too; After the Ball; Sweet Bunch of Daisies; In the Shadow of the Pines; On the Banks of the Wabash; Mary has Gone with a “Coon.”