“The Knickerbocker Line”

Description

The earliest versions seem to involve a man who became involved with a seamstress who later stole his watch. In the U.S. this plot seems to have disappeared, replaced by sundry nonsense. The references to the Knickerbocker Line seems diagnostic

Supplemental text

Knickerbocker Line, The
  Partial text(s)

          *** A ***

From Norman Cazden, Herbert Haufrecht, Norman Studer, Folk Songs
of the Catskills, #146A, pp. 551-552. From the singing of George
Edwards.

My wife she is a tailor, a tailor she is by trade,
Many a pair of pantaloons on time for me she's made,
She'll begin them in the morning, she'll have them ready on time,
She's a regular don't-you-touch-her on the Knickerbocker Line.

  Refrain:
  She's a rig, she's a jig, she's a rippety, skippety dig!
  Skinny-me-dig to my ha, ha, ha, I'll go 'way down south to my Rovering Joe,
  I'll go 'way, and never will come back,
  Till the winter roads are ready and the car is on the track.

(2 additional stanzas)

Cross references

• cf. "The Great Northern Line" (tune & meter)

References

1. Kennedy 323, "The Knickerbocker Line" (1 text, 1 tune)
2. FSCatskills 146, "The Knickerbocker Line" (2 texts, 2 tunes, plus a text of a published antecedant)
3. Meredith/Anderson, p. 195, "The Knickerbocker Line" (1 text, 1 tune)
4. ST K323 (Partial)
5. Roud #2149
6. BI, K323