BYGONE SUSSEX - online book

Essays, Sketches and Illustrations of bygone Sussex

	T HE woman who disguises herself as a man, sometimes from military ardour, some­times under the influence of a gentler passion, is a familiar figure in literature. In the following ballad the nameless Lass of Rye makes but a poor figure by the side of Rosalind or Viola, but she has a certain rustic charm of her own. The adventures of the " True Maid of the South " and her lover, the " Pride of Leicestershire," were printed in ballad form about 1630, and are here reproduced, with the omission of two verses, unessential to the story, which, whilst not offend­ing the ears of the "liberal shepherds" of a bygone generation, might now be deemed objectionable. THE TRUE MAYBE OF THE SOUTH, or, A rare example of a Maide dwelling at Rie, in Sussex, who, for the love of a young man of Lester-shire, went beyond the Sea in the habit of a Page, and after to their hearts content, were both marryed at Magrum, in Germany, and now dwelling at Rye aforesaid.