[home]                     [song index]                         [about miriam]

TAM PEARCE (WIDDICOMBE FAIRE)

(learned from the Penguin Songbook and also Clare Millikan in the 1960s)

Tam Pearce, Tam Pearce, come lend me your mare,
    All along, out along, down along lee,
I want for to ride to the Widdicombe Fair,
    With Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, Peter Gurney, Peter Davy,
    Daniel Whiddon, Harry Hawk, old Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all,
    old Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all!

And when shall I see again my gray mare?
    All along, out along, down along lee,
By Friday night or by Saturday noon,
    Wi' Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, (etc.)

Then Friday night came and Saturday noon,
Tam Pearce's old mare hath not yet trotted home,

So Tam Pearce got up to the top of the hill,
And he spied his old mare a-making her will,

Tam Pearce's old mare, her took sick and her died,
And Tam sate him down on a stone and he cried,

Now this isn't the end of this dreadful affair,
Nor, though they be dead, of the horrid career,
    Of Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, (etc.)

When the wind whistles cold on the moor of a night,
Tam Pearce's old mare doth appear gashly white,

And all the long night be heard skirlings and groans,
From Tam Pearce's old mare in her rattling bones,

(from miriam berg's folksong collection)