+The Text+ is taken from a broadside in the Pepys collection (iv. 196),
which can be dated between 1682 and 1685, and is entitled _Sir Walter
Raleigh sailing in the Low-lands_. Three other copies of the same
edition of the broadside are known.
+The Story+ of the _Sweet Trinity_ has become confused with that of the
_Golden Vanity_ (_Golden Victorie_, _Golden Trinitie_, _Gold Pinnatree_
are variants), which is probably a corrupted form of it; indeed the weak
ending of the broadside challenges any singer to improve upon it. But
again there are two distinct variations of the _Golden Vanity_ ballad.
In the first class, the boy, having sunk the French galley, calls to the
_Golden Vanity_ to throw him a rope, and when it is refused, threatens
to sink her too; whereupon they take him aboard and carry out all their
promises of reward (which vary considerably in the different versions).
In the second class, the boy dies after he is taken up from the water;
in one version he sinks from exhaustion before he can be saved.
The _Sweet Trinity_, however, has been taken by a ship of unspecified
nationality ('false' might easily become corrupted into 'French'); and
thus this ballad deals with three ships, while the _Golden Vanity_
versions mention but two. The latter are still current in folk-song.