The Sweet Trinity
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The Sweet Trinity or The Golden Vanity or The Golden Willow Tree is Child ballad 286. The first surviving version, about 1635, was Sir Walter Raleigh Sailing In The Lowlands (Shewing how the famous Ship called the Sweet Trinity was taken by a false Gally & how it was again restored by the craft of a little Sea-boy, who sunk the Gally
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[edit] Synopsis
A captain of a ship (the Sweet Trinity or Golden Vanity or Golden Willow Tree of the title) laments the danger it is in; Sir Walter Raleigh complains that it was captured by a galley, but the commoner complaint is that it is in danger from another ship, which may be French, Turkish, Spanish, or British. (British is featured in American variants.)
A cabin boy offers to solve the problem. The captain promises him rich rewards, which vary enormously between version. The boy swims to the ship, bores holes in its hull, and sinks it.
He swims back. Usually, the captain declares he will not take him up, let alone reward him; in some variants, he exorts the rescue and reward by threatening to sink his ship as well, but usually, he drowns (sometimes after saying he would sink the ship if it weren't for the crew). Occasionally, the crew rescue him, but he dies on the deck. In the variant with Raleigh, Raleigh is willing to keep some of his promises, but not to marry him to his daughter, and the cabin boy scorns him.
[edit] Media
- Golden Vanity (file info) — play in browser (beta)
- One variant of "The Sweet Trinity", American traditional, closest to Child's version C.
- Problems listening to the file? See media help.
[edit] Variants
Aaron Copland used it as one of the songs in his Old American Songs sets.
