/ · John S. Farmer’s Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes
Retoure My Dear Dell
Retoure My Dear Dell
1725
From The New Canting Dictionary.
I
Each darkmans I pass in an old shady grove,
1 night
And live not the lightmans I toute not my love,
2 day; see
I surtoute every walk, which we used to pass,
3 know well
And couch me down weeping, and kiss the cold grass:
4 lie
I cry out on my mort to pity my pain,
And all our vagaries remember again.
II
Didst thou know, my dear doxy, but half of the smart
5 mistress
Which has seized on my panter, since thou didst depart;
6 heart
Didst thou hear but my sighs, my complaining and groans,
Thou’dst surely retoure, and pity my moans:
7 return
Thou’dst give me new pleasure for all my past pain,
And I should rejoice in thy glaziers again.
8 eyes
III
But alas! ’tis my fear that the false
Patri-coe 9 hedge-priest
Is reaping those transports are only my due:
Retoure, my dear doxy, oh, once more retoure,
And I’ll do all to please thee that lies in my power:
Then be kind, my dear dell, and pity my pain,
And let me once more toute thy glaziers again
IV
On redshanks and tibs thou shalt every day dine,
10 turkey; geese
And if it should e’er be my hard fate to trine,
11 hang
I never will whiddle, I never will squeek,
12 speak
Nor to save my colquarron endanger thy neck,
13 neck
Then once more, my doxy, be kind and retoure,
And thou shalt want nothing that lies in my power.
Notes
See Note to “The Canter’s Serenade.” This song appears to be a
variation of a much older one, generally ascribed to Chas II, entitled
I pass all my hours in a shady old grove.
Taken from
Musa Pedestris,
Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes
[1536―1896], collected and annotated by John S. Farmer.
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