The Banks of the Sweet Primroses

Learned from Saratoga, NY folk trio Huxtable, Christensen and Hood, it was recorded on their 1980 LP Wallflowers.
I recorded it with The Men o’ War Balladeers in 2019, on Low Lie the Fields. My vocal arrangement is available here as a scanned PDF, free to reuse with credit.

As I roved out, on a midsummer’s morning,
To view the meadows and to take the air
Down by the banks of the sweet primroses,
There I beheld a most lovely fair.

With three long steps, I stepped up to her,
Not knowing her as she passed me by,
I stepped up to her, thinking for to view her,
She appeared to me like some virtuous bride

I says fair maid, “Where are you going,
And what’s the occasion of all your grief,
I’ll make you as happy as any lady,
If you will grant to me one small relief.”

“Stand off, stand off!” You’re a false deceiver,
You are deceitful and a false young man,
It’s you that’s caused my poor heart to wander,
And to grant me comfort it is all in vain.”

I will go down, in some lonesome valley,
Where no man on earth shall there me find
Where the pretty little songbirds do change their voices,
And every moment blows blusterous winds

Come all young men, who go a courting,
Pray pay attention to what I say,
For there’s many a dark and a cloudy morning,
Turns out to be a sunshiny day.