In the "Character of a Ballad-monger," in Whimzies, 1631, we find: "Stale ballad news, cashiered the city, must now ride fast for the country, where it is no less admired than a giant in a pageant: till at last it grows so common there, too, as every poor milkmaid can chant and chirp it under her cow, which she useth as a harmless charm to make her let down her milk."
In Beaumont and Fletcher's play, The Coxcomb, Nan, the Milkmaid, says:
"Come, you shall e'en home with me, and be our fellow;
Our home is so honest!
And we serve a very good woman, and a gentlewoman;
And we live as merrily, and dance o' good days
After evensong. Our wake shall be on Sunday:
Do you know what a wake is? we have mighty cheer then."
Who does not remember old Isaac Walton and his merry ballad-singing dairy-maid?
Pepys, in his Diary, 13th October, 1662, writes: "With my father took a melancholy walk to Portholme, seeing the country-maids milking their cows there, they being there now
