Uploaded September 2021 | Updated September 2026, 3 days ago
Beneath the Window of My Cell / The Swallow in My Prison Cell / The Prisoner's Song / The Convict's Song (Roud No. 5122) - Sung by Christina MacAllister of Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Recorded by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger in 1962. From "Travellers' Songs from England and Scotland" (2015) MTCD254.
Note by Kevin W.:
This song is rare, apart from Christina MacAllister only Sheila Stewart has been recorded singing it. Sheila learned it from Christina's singing while working in the berryfields of Blairgowrie in the sixties.
An Irish singer, Willie McElroy of County Fermanagh, has been recorded singing a related song in 1977 which came to be known as "The Swallow in My Prison Cell" (Roud No. 8122). The two songs share the same opening and ending verse but McElroy's song continues with the prisoner lamenting the loss of his companion when the bird makes its leave in winter.
If Christina's second verse was brought into the text from "The Boston Burglar" (Roud No. 261) or another transportation ballad it might be argued that her song is but a fragment of McElroy's longer text.
Song Notes by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger:
Scots travelling folk who sing this song all appear to have learned it from the same source - an Irish Traveller named Docherty. Intermittently, over the past five or six years, the editors have questioned Irish singers but have not succeeded in finding any who know the song. That it is Irish is beyond doubt, but that is all that can be said of it with any certainty. The final stanza is one which occurs in many versions of 'The Boston Burglar' (our No.92). Indeed, the use of the word 'penitentiary' and the 'ball and chain' reference in the second stanza suggest that the song may be of American-Irish origin - unless, of course, the equivalent stanza in 'The Boston Burglar' has been culled from an earlier transportation ballad.
Song transcription:
[One morning fair], I strayed where the sparrow built its nest,
For to see the liberty of that bird which did me sorrows pressed [*];
It hops along from bar to bar just the same as it could say:
'Cheer up, old lads, and don't be sad, some day you'se will be free.'
It would [break the heart] of any man, or the heart of any stone
To see so many strapping fellows reduced to skin and bone;
They're all tied round with iron chains, they're attached to a ball of lead;
You can hear them praying from all their hearts, and a-wishing they were dead.
But come all you'se roving fellows, a warning take by me:
O, never you stay out late at night nor keep bad company;
For if you do, you'll sure it rue, you'll bring yourself like me,
For I'm doing seven-and-twenty years in the penitentiary.
* sore oppress
Beneath the Window of My Cell / The Swallow in My Prison Cell / The Prisoner's Song / The Convict's Song (Roud No. 5122) - Sung by Christina MacAllister of Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Recorded by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger in 1962. From "Travellers' Songs from England and Scotland" (2015) MTCD254.
Note by Kevin W.:
This song is rare, apart from Christina MacAllister only Sheila Stewart has been recorded singing it. Sheila learned it from Christina's singing while working in the berryfields of Blairgowrie in the sixties.
An Irish singer, Willie McElroy of County Fermanagh, has been recorded singing a related song in 1977 which came to be known as "The Swallow in My Prison Cell" (Roud No. 8122). The two songs share the same opening and ending verse but McElroy's song continues with the prisoner lamenting the loss of his companion when the bird makes its leave in winter.
If Christina's second verse was brought into the text from "The Boston Burglar" (Roud No. 261) or another transportation ballad it might be argued that her song is but a fragment of McElroy's longer text.
Song Notes by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger:
Scots travelling folk who sing this song all appear to have learned it from the same source - an Irish Traveller named Docherty. Intermittently, over the past five or six years, the editors have questioned Irish singers but have not succeeded in finding any who know the song. That it is Irish is beyond doubt, but that is all that can be said of it with any certainty. The final stanza is one which occurs in many versions of 'The Boston Burglar' (our No.92). Indeed, the use of the word 'penitentiary' and the 'ball and chain' reference in the second stanza suggest that the song may be of American-Irish origin - unless, of course, the equivalent stanza in 'The Boston Burglar' has been culled from an earlier transportation ballad.
Song transcription:
[One morning fair], I strayed where the sparrow built its nest,
For to see the liberty of that bird which did me sorrows pressed [*];
It hops along from bar to bar just the same as it could say:
'Cheer up, old lads, and don't be sad, some day you'se will be free.'
It would [break the heart] of any man, or the heart of any stone
To see so many strapping fellows reduced to skin and bone;
They're all tied round with iron chains, they're attached to a ball of lead;
You can hear them praying from all their hearts, and a-wishing they were dead.
But come all you'se roving fellows, a warning take by me:
O, never you stay out late at night nor keep bad company;
For if you do, you'll sure it rue, you'll bring yourself like me,
For I'm doing seven-and-twenty years in the penitentiary.
* sore oppress
