Words and music by Winfield Shaw Clark
Download:
Sheet music (80K pdf)
Elizabeth Chadwick, Midwife.mp3
One hundred and one.
Yet I still ride horseback over the dunes,
I’m still a midwife.
I know ev’ry child in town –
Now some are full-grown –
And I have heard their poor mothers moan,
Delivering them to life.
I was once a wife, two children born
Two children born, but oh!, that was all.
My son’s down east, a settler,
Husband, daughter, both were called.
I went to apprentice then
Dame Sarah, midwife.
She knew all the white herbs:
Plantain, vervain,
Oyl of St. Johnswort.
And when Mistress passed away
Her cloak fell to me,
And I ride horseback over the dunes;
Deliver thy babes to thee.
Leaf of tansy bruised, a soothing tea,
Oyl of St. Johnswort eases her pain
Milady must not fever;
Bathe her body with vervain.
I am an old woman now,
One hundred and one.
Yet I still ride horseback over the dunes,
I’m still a midwife.
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