Young Riley (I)

DESCRIPTION: Singer meets woman who "appeared to me like an angel bright." She rejects his proposal. She was seduced years ago by Riley. Singer asks her to go to Pennsylvania. She refuses. She will always love Riley. Girls are foolish. He leaves
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1749 (Dicey and Dicey 1754 catalog referring to 1749 publication)
KEYWORDS: love seduction rejection emigration separation beauty America Ireland rake
FOUND IN: US(NE) Scotland(Aber) Ireland
REFERENCES (8 citations):
Frank-JollySailorsBold 103, "William Riley" (1 text, 1 tune)
Henry/Huntingdon/Herrmann-SamHenrysSongsOfThePeople H826, p. 309, "James Reilly" (1 text, 1 tune) (see NOTES)
ADDITIONAL: Christie, W and William Christie., _Traditional Ballad Airs_ vol. 2. (Edinburgh: David Douglas, 1881 ("Digitized by Internet Archive")) pp. 242-243, "The Forsaken Maiden" (1 text, 1 tune)
(no author listed), _A Collection of American Songs and Ballads, 205 in Number_ 1840. (Boston: 1840 ("Digitized by Google")), p. 112, "John Riley" (broadside) (1 text)
(no author listed), _The Humming Bird Songster_, (New York: P.J. Cozans, 1856-1861 ("Digitized by Google")), pp. 15-16, "John Riely" (1 text)
Leslie Shepard, _John Pitts, Ballad Printer of Seven Dials, London 1765-1844_, (London: Private Library Association, 1969), p. 118, "Young Riley" (reprint of a Pitts broadside)
(no author listed), _The Universal Irish Song Book_. (New York: P.J. Kennedy, 1881 ("Digitized by Internet Archive"), p. 103, "Young Riley" (1 text)
(Anonymous), _The Bloody Gardener's Garland_, 1779, pp. 6-7, "(As I Went Over) The County of Cavin"
Roud #267
RECORDINGS:
Eddie Butcher, "Youghal Harbour" (on IREButcher01)
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Bod8041 Harding B 16(316a), "Young Riley" ("As I was walking through the county of Cavan"), J. Catnach (London), 1813-1838; also Bod13960 Harding B 11(746), "Young Riley"("As I was walking through the county of Cavan"), H. Such (London), 1863-1885
Peal Collection 2, n.d., "Young Riley"
Dicey and Dicey, "The Soldier and the Irish Lady" in _The Royal Sportsman's Delight_ (London: Alderney Church Yard [Cluer Dicey and William Dicey], 1754)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]" (another member of "Young Riley" family; notes and references there)
cf. "O'Reilly from the County Leitrim" (another member of "Young Riley" family; notes and references there)
NOTES [1686 words]: Although it would seem on its face that the two John (George) Riley songs (Laws N36 and N37), are related, and this one related to both, this does not seem to have been originally so. Rather, they originated separately, then N37 was modified to be closer to N36. Ben Schwartz has done a detailed study of this which turns N37 into three songs, "Young Riley (I)," "John (George) Riley (II)" [Laws N37], and "O'Reilly from the County Leitrim." Ben's conclusion is that "If you are not aware of the history of Laws N37 -- specifically that RILEY RETURNS is a two-line add-on that changes Riley from a jilter to a noble sailor -- then Laws N36 and Laws N37 look like the 'same story.' Laws N36 broadsides were circulating around 1800. RILEY RETURNS may have been added to create Laws N37 'John Riley' later than that. Maybe the Laws N36 story 'inspired' Laws N37 singers to add RILEY RETURNS and create the 'same story.' In any case, they are not the 'same song.'" Ben demonstrates this by showing that, in addition to originally-divergent plots, there are no lines the same in the original versions.
Ben's detailed discussion of the history of the three N37 types is below. - RBW
[Data for the] Peal Collection 2 [broadside]: ?. W. Hugh Peal Manuscript Collection Album of Broadside Ballads vol. 2 @
https://exploreuk.uky.edu/catalog/xt7qjq0stw344356?q=album+of+broadside+ballads&perpage=20#page/201/mode/1up/search/album+of+broadside+ballads
The date for The Humming Bird Songster is 1856-1861.
The source for P.J. Cozans date at 107 Nassau Street is Cary Sternick, 2022, "Huestis & Cozans, New York; P.J. Cozans, New York" in Timothy Shay Arthur @ https://tsarthur.com/publishers/cozans.html?form=MG0AV3
N.B. Sam Henry's "James Reilly" has a happy ending but is not John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]]
The last verse of Songs of the People H826, "Jaimes Riley," is
When he saw that this maid was constant,
The secret to her he did make known,
Saying, 'I'm your love and your long lost Reilly,
And since we've met, we will part no more."
A happy ending is typical of the song indexed here as "John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]."
Why is this song indexed as "Young Riley (I)"?
The typical "John (George) Riley (II)" songs end:
When he found that her heart was loyal
He gave her kisses one two and three
Saying I am the man you call Riley
Who's been the cause of your misery.
The first two lines are shared with Laws N42, "Pretty Fair Maid."
The singer of Sam Henry's "James Reilly" may have heard about the American happy ending version but did not sing that version's ending. - BS
The "Young Riley" Family of Songs
Introduction
Three closely related songs are entries in this index.
"Young Riley" developed first, in Ulster, late in the eighteenth century.
"John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]" developed a few years later and, though it added "Irish" features, has been collected only in North America.
"O'Reilly from the County Leitrim" likely developed in Ulster in the middle of the nineteenth century. It has since been carried to Scotland and Canada.
The NOTES for each of the songs includes my speculation about how that song developed.
Each note includes this "Introduction."
Each ends with my speculation: "How I think it developed"
The notes for "John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]" and "O'Reilly from the County Leitrim" include a "Previously" paragraph explaining my view of the text as it looked before this branch of the family developed.
The differences between songs are all a matter of accretion.
The early "Young Riley" remains the core of the other two songs.
Each of the three adds verse-sets that change the story.
I refer to a text built of "the early 'Young Riley'" and one or more verse-sets as "chimera."
Chimera, in Greek mythology, is a composite being made up of parts of recognizable creatures:
"Iobates ordered him to kill the Chimera ...;
it had the fore part of a lion, the tail of a dragon,
and its third head, the middle one, was that of a goat,
through which it belched fire"
(Frazer, 1921, 151 The Library 2.3.1-2)
(James George Frazer, Apollodorus The Library Vol. 1 (London: William Heinemann: 1921 ("Digitized by Internet Archive"))
A chimera, in the notes, is a composite text that includes a theme or verse-set taken from one source and grafted onto an already complete text of another source.
In this case, the "complete text of another source" is "Young Riley."
When I refer to the whole piece of introduced text by name I capitalize it. The main grafts that affect the "Young Riley" family tree are PHOENIX ISLAND, SWAN, RILEY CURSED, and RILEY RETURNS.
Each is described in the note for the song it appears in.
--- "Young Riley" - How I think it developed. ---
In A Secret Stream Vol. 2, Steve Gardham discusses the earliest text he has for "Young Riley." His Dicey and Dicey's "The Soldier and the Irish Lady" is earlier than any other I have seen. Steve writes:
The ballad ("Reilly from the Co. Leitrim") is ... a rewrite of a mid-eighteenth century piece called "The Soldier and the Irish Lady printed by Dicey of London and in this the setting is Cornwall. There are at least two copies in the British Library and these show obvious signs of not being the original in that they are somewhat garbled. Curiously a later version Young Riley (Roud 267) printed by the likes of Catnach in the 1830s is much more cohesive and seems to be earlier in certain details than the Dicey copy."
(Nick Dow, Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne and Steve Gardham. 2023. A Secret Stream vol. 2 (London: Francis Boutle Publishers, 2023), p. 214)
The earliest text I have -- Dicey and Dicey, "The Soldier and the Irish Lady" -- takes place in Cornwall.
An English soldier meets an Irish woman.
She has been jilted, years past, by Riley.
Riley lives in "the country."
The courting soldier would have the woman sail away with him on the warship "Prince of Wales."
She laughs at his naivety and warns him not to bind himself so young in marriage.
By his name we know Riley to be Irish Roman Catholic.
The broadside is English. Nothing ties the ballad to Scots-Irish Presbyterians, the likely singers of later "Young Riley" texts.
Much earlier -- beginning in 1678 --"the English establishment faced the possibility of a Roman Catholic successor to the throne. Ironically, in their efforts to avoid that crisis, the Anglicans attacked the Protestant Dissenters in Ireland, including Quakers and Presbyterians. Escape to "the colonies" would have been an appreciated emigration option.
Quaker William Penn negotiated for land with Charles II to settle the king's debt to Penn's father. That land was named Pennsylvania and Penn established a Quaker colony there. The Irish Quakers emigrated to Pennsylvania between 1682 and 1750. The Quaker toleration of different believers made Pennsylvania a "land of Canaan" for other Dissenters, including the Ulster Scots-Irish Presbyterians. The Presbyterians continued emigrating to Pennsylvania, outnumbering the Quakers. When land became too expensive in Pennsylvania the Scots-Irish used that colony as a jumping-off point for other colonies. Pennsylvania remained their landing-place in the colonies.
No later than 1779, the ballad changed to use Ulster counties as the site of the ballad, and sailing to Pennsylvania replaced sailing in "the Prince of Wales."
The 1779 "Bloody Gardner" chapbook (a182, 1779) includes an incomplete "Young Riley" text. I believe it is completed in by an 1850 song in Christie and Christie's Traditional Ballad Airs.
It is the earliest text I have that tells the "Young Riley" story:
- The ballad opens in the Ulster county of Cavan.
- The narrator-courter meets a woman "that looked like an angel bright."
- When he asks her to marry she says she prefers the single life.
- Years before she was jilted by Jamie Riley, who lived in Dublin.
- The narrator asks her to go with him to Pennsylvania.
- She says she still loves Riley.
- He says that "youth and folly" led her to believe the jilter would marry her.
- He leaves, sometimes headed by himself to America
"Young Riley" hardly changes after the Catnach broadside. The song is collected in Ulster. Here is the "basic" "Young Riley" story. This is the core of "John (George) Riley (II) [Laws N37]" and "O'Reilly from the County Leitrim."
- The story takes place in County Cavan, Ulster.
- The narrator-courter meets a woman who "appeared to me like an angel bright"
- When he asks her to marry she says she prefers the single life.
- Years before she was jilted by John Riley, who lived in this country.
- Riley had courted her "night and day," until "he gained his free will of me."
- Then Riley "left this country and went away."
- The narrator tells her to sail with him to Pennsylvania.
- She refuses, saying she will always love Riley.
- Youth and folly makes young maids bind themselves and they "must obey"; "what can't be cured must be endured."
- The narrator-courter leaves, alone.
There is a development in the United States that I find only on a broadside copy and songbooks:
- Frank, "William Riley" (1824)
- The Humming Bird Songster,"John Riely" (1856-1861)
- The Universal Irish Song Book, "Young Riley" (1881)
In these texts, RILEY CURSED is grafted on the end of the "basic" "Young Riley" story. RILEY CURSED is a set of three verses from "Peggy Gordon," "Madam I Have Gold and Silver," and "Fair and Tender Ladies," respectively. It ends, "But surely there's a place of torment To punish my lover for slighting me."
Captain Samuel Bunker copied this text into his journal "on an 1824-27 whaling voyage from Nantucket, ... one of the earliest transcriptions of a broadside-type ballad recovered from the whaling manuscripts." (Frank, 2010, 227). Among Frank's points is that songs were not in journals to be read, but to be sung (Frank, 2010, xiv, xviii). The song was in print in the United States for at least fifty-seven years (1824-1881). It is not likely that Captain Bunker was the only one that sang it. I just haven't run across any report of it having been sung. - BS
File: RcYouR1

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