George Collins Collected by Bob Copper in about 1954 from Enos White in Axford, Hampshire: see Chapter Thirteen, pp. 108-113, of Songs and Southern Breezes for the details; and the appendix for these words.
George Collins walked out one May morning,
When May was all in bloom,
And there he saw a fair pretty maid,
A-washing a white marble stone.She whooped, she hollered, she called so loud,
And waved her lily-white hand;
Come hither to me, George Collins, cried she,
For your life it won't last you long.He put his benbow down on the bank side,
And over the river he sprang,
He clipped his hands round her middle so small,
And kissed her red rosy cheeks.George Collins rode home to his father's own house,
And knocked at the ring;
Arise, arise, dear father, he cried,
Arise and let me in.Arise, arise, dear mother, he cried,
Arise and shake up my bed,
Arise, arise, dear sister, he cried,
Get a napkin to tie round my head.For if I should die this night,
As I suppose I shall,
You bury me under that white marble stone,
That lays in fair Eleander's hall.Fair Eleander sat in her hall one day
A-weaving her silk so fine,
She saw the finest corpse a-coming
That ever her eyes shone on.Fair Eleander said unto her head maid,
Whose corpse is this so fine?
She made a reply, George Collins' corpse,
An old true lover of thine.O, put him down my little brave boys
And open his coffin so wide
That I may kiss George Collins' cheeks,
For ten thousand times he has kissed mine.This news was carried to fair London town
And wrote on London Gate,
There was six pretty maids died all in one night
All for George Collins' sake.
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