Boys Of Bedlam

Words traditional
Music by Nic Jones and Dave Moran
(Steeleye Span)

Dm                       C       Dm
For to see mad Tom of Bedlam ten thousand miles I'd travel 
                          C           Dm
Mad Maudlin goes on dirty toes for to save her shoes from gravel.


Chorus (after every verse): 
                                          C
     Still I sing bonnie boys, bonnie mad boys,
     Dm
     Bedlam boys are bonnie
                                               C
     For they all go bare and they live by the air
              Dm      C         Dm
     And they want no drink nor money.


I went down to Satan's kitchen for to get me food one morning 
And there I got souls piping hot all on the spit a-turning.

My staff hath murdered giants and my bag a long knife carries 
For to cut mince pies from children's thighs with which to feed
the fairies

My spirit's white as lightning and on me travels guides me 
The moon would shake and the stars would quake if ever they
espied me.

And when that I have murdered the man in the moon to a powder 
His staff I'll break and his dog I'll shake and there'll howl no
demon louder

For to see mad Tom of Bedlam ten thousand years I'd travel 
Mad Maudlin goes on dirty toes for to save her shoes from gravel.


The priory of St. Mary of Bethlehem at Bishopsgate, founded in
1247, became the male lunatic asylum known as Bethlehem Hospital
or Bedlam in 1547.  In 1815 it was moved to Lambeth in the
buildings now housing the Imperial War Museum and in 1931 was
moved to Beckenham in Kent.  The hospital of St. Mary Magdalen
(Maudlin) was its female counterpart.  During the 16th and 17th
centuries the man in the moon was depicted as a bent old man with
a staff leading a dog, carrying a thorn bush and lantern.

Maddy Prior says, "Bedlam was the popular name given to Bethlehem
Hospital for the Insane.  This lyric, set to music by Nic Jones
and Dave Moran, has a certain Brechtian quality and is certainly
one of the most grotesque and alarming images of madness that I
know."

Lyric collected from Tom Walsh of the Combine Harvester via Tommy
Gilfellon

On "Please To See The King" LP, copyright (c) 1971 by B&C