Who's the Pretty Girl Milking the Cow?
Channel: Stephen Griffith
Date: 2020-04-04

Day 19 of the American Songbag Stay-at-Home Series  (folksongindex.com) 

I think this song has the most beautiful tune in the entire Songbag. Sandburg writes, "The fragment here is probably a make-over, a distillation, from an Irish song of lesser grace and melody. Bob Lee sang this for me, but wasn't sure he had the words right; he would see the traffic policeman, Tom Burke, and be sure; and Burke said, 'Why should ye be wantin' that little song? It's old. Everybody knows it.'"

Manus O'Conor,  in his Old-Time Songs and Ballads of Ireland seems more complete than Sandburg. He hears her singing and professes to be "your captive slave for the future." She is not taken in by his profession, nor by his claim that "The Indies afford no such jewel" or that he would trade "the wealth of great Omar... Devonshire's treasure ... the lamp of Aladdin" , blah, blah blah.  He warns a young maid is like a ship sailing, She doesn't know how long she may steer and he asks her to marry.