CHAPTER XI.

’Tis Ale, immortal Ale I sing! Bid all the Muses throng! Bid them awake each slumbering string, Till the loud chords responsive ring To swell the lofty song!
Brasenose College Shrovetide Poem.
These venerable ancient song inditers Soar’d many a pitch above our modern writers; Our numbers may be more refin’d than those, But what we’ve gained in verse we’ve lost in prose; Their words no shuffling double meaning knew, Their speech was homely, but their hearts were true.
Rowe.

OLD BALLADS, SONGS AND VERSES RELATING TO ALE AND BEER.

LONG ago, in the merry days when the chil­ling in­flu­ence of Pu­ri­tan­ism had not yet put an end to the ma­jor­ity of our sports and pas­times, and when any­one who had ven­tured to speak of a May-pole as a “Stinckyng Idoll” would most likely have been ducked in the nearest pond as a proper reward for his calumny, the lower orders of England were far more musical than at present; and there existed a great demand for bal­lads to be sung at vil­lage merry-makings, ale-house gath­er­ings, and dur­ing the long win­ter even­ings which would have been dull indeed without the cheer­ing in­flu­ence of song. {295}

Of the quaint old ballads, written mostly in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, a splendid collection was made by the Earl of Oxford (born in 1661), to whom we are also indebted for the Harleian MSS., now in the British Museum. These ballads are known as the Roxburghe Collection, and a selection of them is given in this chapter, together with facsimile reproductions of the curious woodcuts with which the originals are adorned.62

62 Most of the Roxburghe Ballads have been reprinted by the Ballad Society, and for the very scanty information we have been able to gather concerning them we are in a great measure indebted to the Editors of these reprints. Our illustrations have been taken in every case from the original ballads, and are, we believe, the only exact facsimile reproductions in existence.

The most important ballad connected with the subject of ale and beer is Sir John Barley-corne, of which there are many versions. It seems very probable that the original is not in existence, for at a very early date songs bearing the same name, and containing in effect the same words, were known both in the North of England and in the West Country. In later editions of Sir John Barley-corne old printers seem to have frequently varied the text, and in recent times Burns has recast the verses of the old ballad.

The version given below is the oldest in the Roxburghe Collection, and must have been written at some time previous to the reign of James I. To anyone who has perused these pages so far, the pretty allegory contained in the ballad will not require explanation, but it may be well to point out that Sir John is the grain of barley which the farmer, the maltster, the miller, and the brewer do their best to destroy. However, after having forced Sir John to go through the various processes of agriculture, malting, and brewing, a friend, Thomas Good-ale, comes to the poor fellow’s assistance with mickle might, and takes “their tongues away, their legs or else their sight.” The illustration is taken from a later version.