Tune of the Day: Madam, Will You Walk?
The earliest printed copy of this traditional tune appeared in 1849. Originally from Cheshire, it was used in some areas as a two team singing game.
Will you accept of the key of my heart
To bind us together and to never never part?
Madam, will you walk?
Madam, will you talk with me?
No, I won't accept of the key of your heart
To bind us together and to never never part.
Neither will I walk,
Neither will I talk with you.
In many versions of the song, after many stanzas the lady's cupidity is at last excited by some especially magnificent offer, and, on her consenting, the man refuses to have anything to do with her.
This is very similar in subject to “The Keys of Canterbury”, but this tune has radically different characteristics, being in duple meter and in major mode.