Seldom Cleanly (1650)

 

Draw near, you country girls

And listen unto me

I’ll tell you all a new conceit concerning huswifrey:

Three aunts I had of late,

Good huswifes all were they

But cruel death hath taken

The best of them away.

 

O this was one of my aunts

And the best of all the three

And surely though I say it myself,

A cleanly woman was she.

 

But when she went to see

Her cattle in the fields,

When she comes home two pounds of dirt

Hang draggling at her heels.

And there she let it hang

From Candlemas to May,

And then she took a hatchet in hand

And chopped it clean away.

 

Another trick she had

As I shall now declare,

She only swept the house out

About four times a year,

And when she swept the hall

The parlour or the spense,

The dust was worth to her, at least,

A shilling of fourteen pence.

 

The garment she did wear

Did shine like a brazen crock,

And where she went she bore such a scent

That the flies blew up her frock.

If otherwise she had but of a disclout fail

She’d set them for the dog to lick

And wipe them with his tail.

 

My aunt so curious was,

As I to you may tell,

She used to make fat puddings

In markets for to sell.

The smallest candle’s end

My aunt would never lose

It would help to make her puddings fat

With the droppings of her nose,

 

But to conclude in haste,

I hold it not amiss

I love a cleanly huswife well

As may appear by this.

I love a cleanly huswife well

As may appear by this.

 

— Martin Parker

 

 

The Winchester Wedding (1684)

 

At Winchester was a wedding

The like was never seen

Twixt lusty Ralph of Redding

And bonny Black Bess of the Green.

The fidlers were crowding before,

Each lass was as fine as a queen.

There was a hundred and more

For all the country came in.

Brisk Robin led Rose so fair,

She looked like a Lily o’ the Vale

And ruddy fac’d Harry led Mary,

And Roger led bouncing Nell.

 

The Bride came out to meet ‘em,

Afraid the dinner was spoiled

And usher’d ‘em in to treat ‘em,

With baked and roasted and boiled.

The lads were so frolick and jolly,

For each had his love by his side,

But Willy was mad melancholy

For he had a mind to the Bride.

Then Philip begins her health,.

And turns a beer glass on his thumb,

But Jenkin was reckoned for drinking,

The best in Christendom.

 

And now they had din’d advancing

Into the midst of the hall,

She struggled and blushed and frowned

And ready with anger to cry

‘Cause Arthur with tying her garter

Had slip’d up his hand too high.

 

And now for throwing the stocking,

The bride away was led

The groom got drunk and was knocking

For Candles to light ‘em to bed.

Sukey that danced with the cushion

An hour from the room had been gone

And Barnaby knew by her blushing

That some other dance had been done.

And thus of fifty fair maids

That went to the Wedding with men

Scarce five of the fifty were left ye

That so did return again.

 

— Thomas d’Urfey