INVERNESS

Mrs Alexander McEwan gave Carpenter one song, 'learned from her father and grandfather, William and John Newlands, 46 years ago, between Inverness and Foyers.' The most usual title of the ballad is 'Babylon : The Bonny Banks of Fordie', sometimes 'of Airdire'. of which her 'of Eldrie' seems a variant. Here is her remarkable account of the story, which she called Bubblin Johnnie.
'The seven robbers induced Bubblin Johnnie, a herd boy whom they thought to be silly, to rob for them. They put him up to attack sisters.When he found out he had murdered his sisters, he went back and murdered them [the robbers].
'The singer was trembling and eyes were shining as she sang [strong face, like lioness] as if under some strange spell. She was loath to sing concluding verses. "Two heavy, awful". She had heard the preached against in pulpit'!

{NOTE the cylinder recording has two more songs that sound like her but only the lyric of the 'Bonny Banks' seem to appear under her name in the archives.]

Card images are used courtesy of the James Madison Carpenter Collection, American Folklife Center, Library of Congress.