June Tabor – vocals
Huw Warren – piano
Track 7 on An Echo of Hooves (2003)
Sweet William arose on a May morning,
And he dressed himself in blue;
“We want you to tell of that long love that’s been
Between Lady Marget and you.”
“Oh, I know nothing of Lady Marget’s love,
And I know she don’t love me.
Before tomorrow morning at eight of the clock
Lady Marget a bride shall see.”
Lady Marget was a-sitting in her own bower room,
Combing back her yellow hair,
And she saw Sweet William and his new wedded bride
And the lawyers a-riding by.
It’s down she stood her ivory comb,
And back she threw her hair,
And it’s you may suppose and be very well assured,
Lady Marget was heard no more.
The day being past and the night coming on,
When most all men were asleep,
Something appeared to Sweet William and his bride
And stood at their bed feet.
Saying, “How do you like your bed making,
And how do you like your sheets?
And how do you like that new wedded bride
That lies in your arms and sleeps?”*
“Very well do I like my bed making,
Much better do I like my sheets,
But best of all is that gay lady
That stands at my bed feet.”
The night being past and the day coming on,
When most all men were awake,
Sweet William he said he was troubled in his head
By the dreams that he dreamed last night.
“Such dreams, such dreams cannot be true,
I’m afraid they’re of no good.
I dreamed that my chamber was full of wild swine,
And my bride’s bed floating in blood.”
He’s called down his waiting men,
One by two by three,
Saying, “Go and ask leave of my new wedded bride
If Lady Marget I mayn’t go and see.”
He’s rode up to Lady Marget’s own bower room
And tingled all on the ring,
And who was so ready as her own born brother
To rise and let him in.
“Is Lady Marget in her own bower room,
Or is she in her hall?
Or is she high in her chambery
Amongst the ladies all?”
“Lady Marget’s not in her own bower room,
Nor neither is she in her hall,
But she is in her long cold coffin
Lies pale against yon wall.”
“Unroll, unroll those winding sheets,
Although they’re very fine,
And let me kiss them cold pale lips
Just as often as they’ve kissed mine.”
It’s first he’s kissed her ivory cheeks,
And then he’s kissed her chin,
And when he kissed them cold pale lips
There was no breath within.
Three times he’s kissed her ivory cheeks,
Three times he’s kissed her chin,
And the last time he kissed them cold pale lips
It crushed his heart within.
Lady Marget died like it might be today,
Sweet William he died on tomorrow,
Lady Marget she died for pure true love,
Sweet William he died for sorrow.
Lady Marget was buried in yons churchyard,
Sweet William was buried by her,
And out of her grave sprung a red, red rose,
Out of his a green, green briar.
And they both growed up the old church wall
Till they could not grow any higher,
And they met and they tied in a true love’s knot,
Red rose around green briar.
William, who has long loved Margaret, is about to marry a different woman. Why? Our only clue is in the first dialogue. On the eve of William’s wedding, the unattributed “we” – the pronoun seems to signify William’s family circle – ask William to tell us about his long love affair with Margaret, as if to remind him where his heart lies. To which William replies that he is certain that Margaret doesn’t love him. How wrong can he be?
There’s resentment in William’s voice when he continues, “Before tomorrow morning at eight of the clock / Lady Marget a bride shall see.” He’s marrying another woman to get back at Margaret for not loving him. But Margaret does love William, so his “revenge” on her is disastrously ill-judged. When Margaret observes the aftermath of the wedding from her bower window, her devastation is signalled through her apparently trivial actions with hair and comb. She doesn’t commit suicide, or she wouldn’t subsequently be buried in the hallowed precincts of the churchyard. She dies of heartbreak. William doesn’t learn of her death immediately.
On their wedding night, “something” – Margaret’s ghost – appears at the foot of the newly-weds’ bed, and asks William how he likes his situation? If ghosts are embodiments of repressed emotional states, then the appearance of this one suggests that William has already deeply regretted his marriage to his unfortunate bride, and foreshadows his awareness of just how fatal his choice of a marital partner has been.
In the morning William rationalizes the apparition as part of a shattering nightmare: rampaging wild swine in his bedchamber and a marital bed swimming in blood. The swine represent an invasion of undomesticated aggression and chaos, and the bloody bed is an ominous prophecy of a doomed marriage. The Internet is full of not very convincing interpretations of dreams of this kind, suggesting that they’re common. Maybe they are, but there’s no doubt that anyone who reports such dreams is likely to be deeply disturbed – “troubled in the head” is William’s phrase – and will desperately seek reassurance.
William, guiltily via his servants, asks permission of his new bride to go see Lady Margaret. What can she do but grant it? Humiliated, she will suffer longer than anyone from William’s bad judgement, for (as far as we know) she survives the debacle. Margaret’s brother answers the door and delivers the dreadful news. William then goes to kiss Margaret’s corpse, and it’s her cold lips that fully bring home to him what he’s done. Then he too dies of heartbreak.
To die of a broken heart, though rare, is definitely a thing: Takotsubo** cardiomyopathy is what the medical textbooks call the condition in which extreme emotional distress can cause cardiac arrest. Margaret and William are buried side by side in the churchyard, and from their graves spring a climbing rose and briar, that twine in a true love’s knot. For the rest of the world, this is a sign that love survives death, though I doubt William’s widowed bride viewed it so positively.
“Fair Margaret and Sweet William” (Child 74) is #253 in Roud’s index, in which 636 variants are listed. June Tabor’s version has a US provenance: it was collected by Cecil Sharp and Maud Karpeles from Jeff Stockton of Flag Pond, Tennessee in 1916. The ballad seems to have been very popular in the Southern States, and the diction of June Tabor’s version suggests that origin: “I mayn’t go”; “he’s rode up”; “like it might be today”; “growed up.” The ballad is older than you’d expect, however. A fragment of it is quoted in a satirical play, The Knight of the Burning Pestle (1607) by Shakespeare’s contemporary Francis Beaumont: “When it was grown to dark midnight, / And all were fast asleep, / In came Margaret’s grimly ghost, / And stood at William’s feet. / You are no love for me, Margaret, / I am no love for you.”
This ballad, with its motif of the posthumously entwined rose and briar, ends in a very similar way to some versions of the much better-known “Barbara Allen” (here in a fine performance by Emmylou Harris). But unlike that ballad with its stereotypical femme fatale, this one is about the grievous consequences of a young man’s misguided decision in love. The ironically named “Sweet” William is the central character, so might be considered primarily a song for a male singer. But its sympathy for all the victims of this situation makes it also quite suitable for female performance.
Given the American origin of this version of the ballad, it’s instructive to listen to the version sung by US “Mother of Folk” Jean Ritchie, accompanying herself on Appalachian dulcimer, on her 1960 album British Traditional Ballads in the Southern Mountains, Volume 2, as this one is the basis for Tabor’s version. Ritchie, a rural Kentuckian, sings a version with refrains, but her dulcimer is not the most melodious instrument and her phrasing is too unvaried for my taste.
Shirley Collins, influenced by Ritchie, gives us “Lady Margaret and Sweet William” on her album The Power of the True Love Knot (1976). On it Collins notes, “But with all its ambiguities, or maybe because of them, it remains the outstanding ballad of its type where the true-lover’s knot triumphs over human pride, tragedy and death.” She’s right to point to the suggestive power of the unexplained in this ballad – why is William so certain Margaret doesn’t love him? – and her performance is a good one, though it doesn’t quite match June Tabor’s.
June Tabor (b. 1947 in Warwick) doesn’t play any instruments, but she’s a wonderfully versatile singer with immaculate phrasing. Her versions of Eric Bogle’s antiwar classics “The Band Played Waltzing Matilda” (Airs and Graces, 1976) and “No Man’s Land” (Ashes and Diamonds, 1977) will surely never be bettered. She is capable of both sombre soulfulness in her cover of Ian Curtis’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” with Oysterband (Ragged Kingdom, 2011), and passionate anger in that alternative (and in my view greatly to be preferred) national anthem “A Place Called England” (A Quiet Eye, 1999).
Tabor has impeccable folk credentials. As previously noted, she was inspired to become a singer by listening to an Anne Briggs recording. She began her career by singing unaccompanied traditional material in folk clubs. She has twice collaborated with Maddy Prior, most notably on the excellent Silly Sisters album (1976) which opens with “The Doffin’ Mistress” (a song strongly associated with Anne Briggs), and which includes instrumental backing by Martin Carthy, Nic Jones and many other folk notables. June Tabor has twice been named BBC Radio 2 Folk Singer of the Year, in 2004 and 2012.
With her album An Echo of Hooves, recorded April-May 2003 at the Lion Ballroom in Leominster, June Tabor returns to the songs that first made her want to be a singer. She covers eleven traditional Border ballads, all deriving from Child’s great collection, and including such well-known ones as “Lord Maxwell’s Last Goodnight,” “The Cruel Mother,” and “Sir Patrick Spens.”
Her “Fair Margaret and Sweet William” has a simple but perfectly suited piano accompaniment that allows the emotional lyrics to come across with extreme clarity. She sensibly avoids assuming a Nashville twang, though she does pronounce “Margaret” as “Marget,” just as Jean Ritchie had done. On the sleeve Tabor notes, “For me the Ballads of the English (and Scots) speaking peoples are story telling at its stark, urgent best. As you listen – for these are songs in which poetry and music are equally important – feel the wind and rain, see the Hunter’s moon rise and catch an echo of hooves on the night air.” I couldn’t put it better myself.
*Folkies will recognize that this verse is very similar to one in the well-known version of “Matty Groves” on Fairport Convention’s album Liege & Lief. Traditional folk ballads continually recycle preexisting material that serves a present purpose, even if the narrative context is different.
**Takotsubo (蛸壷) is a Japanese word meaning “octopus trap,” “because when affected by this condition, the left ventricle of the heart takes on a shape resembling the round jar used for catching lobsters and octopuses” (Wikipedia).
Holmström Ruddick 