The Dilly Song of Solomon

Agnes Agar’s letter on “The Dilly Song”.

I’ve recently been enjoying browsing the Full English collection, put together by the EFDSS and the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library. One curious find was the above letter from one Agnes W. Agar to the early folksong collector Lucy Broadwood (1858-1929), which includes some rather curious speculations on The Dilly Song. While the speculations about magic are surely way off the mark, the correspondent’s reference to farm men calling it a “secret society song” is interesting. Whether these men were pulling the old antiquarian’s leg, belonged to a rural trade fraternity (such as the Horseman’s or Miller’s Word), or believed that it had an association with Freemasons and their music (- see Katherine Campbell’s article in Oral Tradition [pdf]) cannot be inferred simply from the letter, which I have transcribed below. Broadwood herself has some lengthy notes on the song on pp. 154-9 of her English Country Songs, although this does not appear to be the source where she connects the song with Freemasonry – presumably this was detailed in the correspondence that precedes the letter reproduced below. A note on the song being sung at a Masonic gathering is in an 1887 issue of The Freemason’s Chronicle, but with no deeper association than it being a popular song sung by a brother during a social gathering alongside F.E. “Oh, Danny Boy!” Weatherley’s The Skippers of St. Ives.