Registrars' Office, Court of Chancery.
* * * * *
"A FROG HE WOULD A-WOOING GO."
Your SEXAGENARIAN who dates from "Shooter's Hill," has _not_ hit the mark
when he suggests that Anna Bouleyn's marriage with Henry VIII. (in the
teeth of the Church) is the hidden mystery of the popular old song,--
"Sir Frog he would a-wooing go,
Whether his mother was willing or no."
That some courtship in the history of the British monarchy, leaving a deep
impression on the public mind, gave rise to this generally diffused ballad,
is exceedingly probable; but the style and wording of the song are
evidently of a period much later than the age of Henry VIII. Might not the
madcap adventure of Prince Charles with Buckingham into Spain, to _woo the
Infanta_, be its real origin? "Heigho! for Antony Rowley" is the chorus.
Now "Old Rowley" was a pet name for Charles the Second, as any reader of
the Waverley Novels must recollect. No event was more likely to be talked
about and sung about at the time, the adventurous nature of the trip being
peculiarly adapted to the ballad-monger.