Cecil Sharp's Note 71 (1916)

No. 71. William Taylor

For other versions with tunes, see the Journal of the Folk-Song Society (volume i, p. 254; volume iii, pp. 214–210); and Folk Songs from Somerset (No. 118). No tune is better known to the average English folksinger than this. It is usually in the major or, as in the present case, in the Mixolydian mode, but occasionally (see the versions cited above) in the Dorian or Æolian. A burlesque version of the words, with an illustration by George Cruikshank, is given in the Universal Songster (volume i, p. 6). “Billy Taylor” became a very popular street-song during the first half of the last century, and I suspect that it was during that period that the last stanza in the text was added.