Digital Tradition Mirror

The Unlaid Maid

(This score available as ABC, SongWright, PostScript, PNG, or PMW, or a MIDI file)
Pennywhistle notation and Dulcimer tab for this song is also available

The Unlaid Maid
(Sugden & Nudds--The Kipper Family)

A pure young maid of seventeen I am
And I have never once laid with a man
But its not through lack of trying
And that is why I'm sighing
And I'll tell you all about it if I can.

cho: So I sing, oh dear, oh how can it be?
     I can't find a man that will satisfy me.

Young Roger looked so handsome I could weep
With his hair of brown and eyes of blue so deep,
At the wake I got excited
But my love went unrequited
On the way back from the wake he fell asleep.

On our farm a pretty ploughboy was employed,
I made a tryst that he could not avoid.
I took him to a shady wood
But that did me no good
for it was other pretty ploughboys he enjoyed.

An old Friar showed an interest in my charms,
And I couldn't wait tillI lay in his arms,
But as he tripped to my bed
He tripprd into the well instead
And it wasn't just his pride that came to harm.

A tinker came to call one sunny morn,
Though I knew that he had been a squire born
In the barley straw we lay
And I thought, "Today's the day!"
But it made him sneeze, ao he could not perform.

Just as the tide was flowing, I'd a date
With a jolly sailor. I could hardly wait.
Twenty pounds to him I paid,
But he left me still a maid
And went drinking rum and brandy with his mates.

I met a man all on the beach one day,
He had skin like silk, and on the sand we lay
But before we got to sinnin'
The tide came runnin' in
And he turned into a seal and swam away.

So you can see that I am still intact
Though it's certainly not effort that I've lacked.
When I've rumpled up my gown
The men have let me down
And I just can't do it all on my own back.


Recorded by The Kipper Family
Copyright Dambuster Music
RG
oct99

Thanks to Mudcat for the Digital Tradition!