Holmfirth Anthem

Lyrics

1
Abroad for pleasure as I was a-walking,
It was one summer summer’s evening clear.

Chorus
Abroad for pleasure as I was a-walking,
It was one summer summer’s evening clear.

(Will)Twas there I beheld a most beautiful damsel,
Lamenting for her shepherd dear,

Chorus
Lamenting for her shepherd dear.
Twas there I beheld a most beautiful damsel,
Lamenting for her shepherd dear,
Lamenting for her shepherd dear.

2
The dearest ev’ning that ee’er I beheld,
Was ever ever ever with the lass** I adore, etc.
Wilt thou go fight yon French and Spaniards?
Wilt thou leave me thus, my dear? etc.

3
No more to yon green banks will I take thee,
With pleasure for to rest thyself and view the lambs, etc.
But I will take thee to yon green gardens,
Where those pratty flowers grow,
Where those pratty pratty flowers grow. (Two repeats of these three lines, all in chorus)

** Logic of course requires 'lad' here, not lass, as in 'Songs of the Ridings'.

Recorded by Oliver Knight at the Yorkshire Garland Launch Day Evening Concert, September 15th 2007

This is a contemporary song

Provenance

It is pretty much common knowledge nowadays that this song, although harmonized and arranged c1850 by Joe Perkin, Holmfirth choirmaster, was an adaptation of an existing folk song found on late eighteenth century broadsides titled The Maiden’s complaint for the Loss of her Shepherd. Copies can be seen in the Madden Collection in Cambridge University Library (Slip songs H-N, VWML microfilm 72, item 1059), and in Manchester Central Library in The Warblers Garland (Br f821.04, Ballads vol. 3, p5) of the late eighteenth century. It probably originated in the London pleasure gardens such as Vauxhall or Ranelagh; it certainly has the flowery language associated with the songs of this type.

1
As thro’ yonder grove I walked,
In a summer’s evening clear,
A youthful maiden I espied,
Lamenting for her shepherd dear.

2
Dearest Strephon, I shall see you,
Never more, alas, I fear;
You must fight the French and Spaniards,
Must I leave you thus my dear?

3
On these banks no more you’ll rest you,
Whilst with pleasure you see your lambs,
With looks so innocent and gentle,
Sport beside their fleecy dams.

4
To the wake no more you’ll take me,
Where the lads and lasses go;
In the garden I ne’er shall meet you,
Where the pretty flowers grow.

5
Neptune, God of Britain’s ocean,
Guard my Strephon when he’s away,
Send him safe to England’s shore,
And let me see the happy day.

6
Gentle Strephon, be but constant,
As I’ll be to you my Life;
And if you’ll come home again,
The priest shall make us Man and Wife.

A three-stanza version Abroad for Pleasure, much closer to our Holmfirth Anthem was printed by Harkness of Preston c1850 and this can be seen at Madden Collection 18, Country printers 3, VWML microfilm 85, item 1056. The most noticeable difference between Holmfirth Anthem and the Harkness version is the latter stanza two starts ‘Dearest Edward, when shall I behold thee’.

In most nineteenth century printings of the Holmfirth Anthem the arranger is named J Perkins which should be Perkin.

Excepting Holmfirth Anthem, oral versions of the song are very rare and corrupt. Vaughan Williams collected a single stanza and tune with five other unrelated stanzas at Southampton in 1906 (See Palmer, Folk Songs Collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1983, p178), and Charles Gamblin sent Frank Gardiner a much corrupted four-stanza version from Hampshire in 1907 (See Gardiner Mss, H1000, VWML) again with just the first stanza from the broadside and remnants of the fourth broadside stanza in his fourth stanza.

During most of the twentieth century the song was accepted as part of the west Sheffield carolling tradition despite its references to ‘summer’s evening’ and it is often utilized to round off hunt sings in the Pennine farming districts quite understandably. Since the 1960s and its popularization nationally by The Waterson Family it has also served this function for local folk festivals, to the extent that it has almost become the Yorkshire anthem. Will calls the song by its more popular local title Pratty Flowers.