"The Baffled Knight" or "Blow Away the Morning Dew" () is a traditional ballad existing in numerous variants. The first-known version was published in Thomas Ravenscroft's ''Deuteromelia'' (1609)
with a matching tune, making this one of the few early ballads for which there is extant original music. The song was included in such notable collections as ''
Pills to Purge Melancholy'' by
Thomas d'Urfey (1719–1720) and ''
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry'' by
Thomas Percy (1765).
Versions were collected in England, Scotland, the US, and Canada.
One version was recorded by
Cecil Sharp from John Dingle (
Coryton, Devon, 12 September 1905).
The "Blow Away the Morning Dew" version was used in the third movement of
Ralph Vaughan Williams' ''
English Folk Song Suite'' (1923). Norfolk fisherman
Sam Larner sang this same melody to
Ewan MacColl and
Peggy Seeger
Margaret "Peggy" Seeger (born June 17, 1935) is an American Folk music, folk singer and songwriter. She has lived in Britain for more than 60 years and was married to the singer-songwriter Ewan MacColl until his death in 1989. She is a member ...
in 1958–60, then was filmed performing the song in 1962.
Synopsis
A knight (or in later versions a farmer's son or a shepherd's son) meets a maid away from house and town, sometimes swimming in a brook. He proposes intimacy. She persuades him that they will be more comfortable upon her richly appointed bed, or that if he brings her to her father's house, she will marry him and bring a rich dowry. When they arrive at her home she goes in first and locks him out; in most variants, once safely inside she taunts him for his gullibility.
The ballad generally includes advice to young men not be put off by maidenly protests when they meet defenceless women;
There is a gude auld proverb,
I've often heard it told,
He that would not when he might,
He should not when he would.[A use of this proverb occurs in the literary poem by Robert Henryson, '' Robene and Makyne'']
In one variant, he finds her again, and she tricks him by claiming her lover is near, so that he falls into the river, and a third time, in which she pulls his boots halfway off, so he is unable to get them on or off quickly enough to catch her.
Notes
External links
Several variants
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baffled Knight
Child Ballads
Year of song unknown
Songs with unknown songwriters