Collected by Merlin Mitchell
Transcribed by Kyle Perrin
Reel 19
Item 1
Mrs. Dan McCracken
Strousburgville, Ark.
February 20, 1950
Pretty Little Miss
Mitch •• This is the 20th of February, 1950. We'reat the home of Mrs.
Dan McCracken in Strousburgville, Arkansas. She's forty-seven
years old and knows quite a lot of old songs. She's going to
sing some for us tonight and the first one's called Pretty
Little Miss.
There was a miss out in the garden,
A stranger came riding by,
And this is the way he did address her,
Saying, Pretty little Miss, will you marry me?
Oh, no,kind Sir, I don't want to marry,
As a man of honor, I take you to be,
How can you insist on a fair young maiden,
On a pretty little miss to marry you.
I have a true lover on the ocean,
He's been sailing there for seven long years,
If he sails there for seven years longer,
No other man can marry me.
Perhaps your true lover has been drowned,
Or, perhaps he's in some battle slain,
Or, perhaps he still some pretty girl married,
His face you'll never see again.
Oh, if my true lover has been drowned,
Or, if he's in some battle slain,
Or, if he still some pretty girl married,
I' 11 love the girl that married him.
He tookhis hands both out of his pockets,
His fingers they were slim and small,
Saying, Here is the ring that you put on here,
And down to his feet she then did fall.
He picked her up in his arms so tender,
The kisses he gave her were one, two, three,
Saying, I am the man that you called John Riley,
Who gained your favor and sailed away.
I sailed the Ocean in every motion,
There's riches .laid up in store for me,
So, now we'll marry, no longer tarry,
And never be apart any more.