{"id":25646,"date":"2024-12-07T14:52:44","date_gmt":"2024-12-07T14:52:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=25646"},"modified":"2024-12-07T14:52:47","modified_gmt":"2024-12-07T14:52:47","slug":"norrible-tale-a","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/norrible-tale-a\/","title":{"rendered":"Norrible Tale, A"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
AKA<\/strong><\/td>The Suicidal Family
An Horrible Tale<\/td><\/tr>
First Published<\/td>1865<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Writer\/composer<\/td>EL Blanchard<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>RN24493<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Music Hall Performers<\/strong><\/td>Sam Cowell, JJ Toole<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Submitted as words to an \u201cold song\u201d for\u00a0Sprite\u2019s Article<\/em>, Eastern Evening News (6 Nov 1929), Norfolk England<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Longer (Older?) American version 
Broadside in Goldstein and DeMarsan<\/strong>
\t
Oh! a norrible tale I have to tell,
Of sad disasters that befel
A Family that once resided,
Just in the very same thoroughfare as I did.
The parient was so grim a guffin,
He never liked no man nor nuffin,
And he never made the least endeavor
To make a joke not what-sum-de-ver.

For it is such a norrible tale,
'Twill make your faces all turn pale,
Your eyes with grief will be overcome.
Tweedle twaddle, twiddle-huddle-hum.<\/em>

They never saw no compa-nee,
'Tho they was a most respectable fa-mi-lee,
And every boy and ev'ry Gal ,
Grew hy-po-con-der-i-a-cal.
They thought they had all sorts of sorrows,
And conjured up all kinds of horrors,
Each had a face as long as a ladder,
And was frightened in-to-fits if they see their own shadder.  

They sat with their cur-tains drawn down tight,
On pur-pose to keep out the light,
Father, Mother, Sister and Bro-ther,
Never spoke a word to one ano-ther.
Well, at last, this dole-ful, dismal lot
So very me-lan-cho-ly got,
That an end themselves they did agree,
When they had settled which end it was to be.

First, the Father into the garden did walk,
And cut his throat with a lump of chalk,
Then the Mother and end to herself she put,
By drownding of herself in the water-butt. 
Then the Sister went down on her bended knees,
And smothered herself with toasted cheese,
But the brother who was a determined young fellar,
Went and poisoned himself with his umbrella.  

Then the little baby in the cradle,
Shot itself dead with the silver ladle,
While the servant girl seeing what they did,
Strangled herself with the saucepan lid.
The miserable cat, by the kitchen fire,
Swallowed a portion of the fender, and did expire,
And a fly on the ceiling; this case was the wust-un,
Went and blowed itself up with spontaneous combustion.  

Then in walked the Auctioneer,
Who did with the furniture disappear,
And the broker man, this aint no fable,
Made himself away with a three-legged table.
When the walls saw this, their sides they splits,
The windows cracked themselves to bits,
And so universal was the slaughter-rate,
There was nothing left but an unpaid water-rate.

MORAL.

So, here's a moral, if you choose,
Don't never give way to the blues,
Or you may come to the dreadful ends ,
Of these my melancholy friend. 
For ain't it now  a norrible tale?
Hope it's made your faces all turn pale
Your eyes with grief is overcome.
Tweedle twaddle, twiddle-huddle-hum.


<\/strong>
THE HORRIBLE TALE<\/strong>
Broadside in VWML<\/strong>

Oh! It's a horrible tale I'm going to tell, 
Of a sad misfortune that befel 
A family that once resided,
In the very self-same house that I did.

Oh! it is such a horrible tale,
It's sure to make your cheeks turn pale, 
Your eyes with tears will be over-run,
Wigglety, wagglety, wigglety, wum.<\/em>

They never saw any company.
Tho' a highly respectable family,
Till each grew sadder and sadder,
And each was affrighted at the other's shadow.

They pulled down the blinds to keep out the light, 
Till every thing was as black as night,
And as they were bent on suiciding,
I'll tell you the manner they respectively died in.

One day as the father in the garden did walk, 
He cut his throat with a piece of chalk;
The mother an end to her life did put, 
By hanging herself in the water butt.

The youngest daughter on bended knees, 
Me poisoned herself on toasted cheese ;
The youngest son, a determined young fellow. 
Blew out his brains with an old umbrella.

The gard'ner came in and saw the blood.
He run himself thro' with a stick of Rhubub<\/em>
His wife saw the sight and it turned her savage!
So she burnt herself to death with pickled red cabbage.

The old tom cat as he sat by the fire,
Bit a piece off the fender and then did expire;
The flies on the ceiling their case was the wors'n,
For they blew themselves up with spontaneous combustion

The old cow in the old cow-shed
Took up the pitchfork and knocked off her head
The little donkey hearing the row,
Knocked out its brains with the head of the cow.
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Sheet music for A Norrible Tale <\/em>was first published in 1865,  though according newspaper reports the comic actor JL Toole was  singing this song ten years earlier in December 1855. Toole was still singing it in 1862.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The earliest records of Sam Cowell singing the song are in 1863, for example he performed it at The Mechanics Hall<\/em>, Dundee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have found two slightly different versions of the lyrics, reproduced above. The longer, American, version appears to be closest to those given on the Sheet Music.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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County Rooms<\/em>, Fife Herald\u00a0–\u00a024 April 1856<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Michael Kilgarriff mentions a substantially rewritten version by HJ Whymark, sung by Alfred Vance. Its probable that this refers to a black-comic song usually known as The Sausage Machine<\/em> (RNV14370). See The Canadian Rose Bud<\/em> (1869) archive.org<\/a> and WorldCat entry<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n