Vaughan Williams’s Journey into Folk: 8 January 1905
‘The Lincolnshire Farmer (The Yorkshire Bite)’. Mr Whitby, Tilney All Saints, Norfolk
A Lincolnshire farmer sends his Yorkshire ‘boy’ (servant) to sell a cow at the fair. Having made a good deal with three men to sell the animal for ’six pounds ten’ they all go to the alehouse to finish the transaction. A highwayman sees the money exchange hands and catches up with the servant as he walks home. The young man accepts a lift on his horse but when they get to a dark lane the highwayman demands the money and threatens to kill him. The boy jumps off the horse and throws the money on the ground. While the highwayman tries to find it, the boy jumps back on the horse and rides away to the farm. Once safely home he and the farmer find a large amount of money in the saddle. The farmer is well pleased and gives him three-quarters of it, saying ‘Though hast put upon him a clean Yorkshire bite’.
In the Journal of the Folk-Song Society (8, 1906) Frank Kidson noted that he had found a magazine dating from 1766 called The Universal Museum which included a prose account of the Yorkshire boy and the highwayman as if it was real news – though he guessed that the editor may have simply been filling space. The verses were available in chapbooks and broadsides from the mid-18th century. A ‘Yorkshire bite’ means something like a ‘shrewd trick’.
Continuing his stay in Tilney, Vaughan Williams collected a further seven songs on this day from John Whitby, the sexton. Later, the composer claimed that he found the weekend in the Tilneys disappointing, as he had already collected most of the songs offered – including ‘The Streams of Lovely Nancy’ and ‘The Red Barn (Maria Marten)’. Despite this he included Whitby’s melody for ‘The Lincolnshire Farmer’ as a theme in Norfolk Rhapsody No. 3 (first performed 1907, later withdrawn).
After this second singing session with Whitby, Vaughan Williams ‘was about to leave the district in despair’ – as he recalled several decades later - when ‘a curate at King’s Lynn asked him if he would like to see the fishing people in the North Town.’ On the following day (tomorrow ) the curate and the composer both went to hear the fishermen sing, and ‘reaped a rich reward...’
Vaughan Williams Memorial Library link: https://www.vwml.org/record/RVW2/3/61
Roud No. 2637
Next post: 9 January