Annotation:Johnny Millicent's Hornpipe
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JOHNNY MILLICENT'S HORNPIPE. AKA and see "Millicent's Hornpipe." Scottish, Hornpipe. D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABBCC. Millicent may have been a professional dancer, although definitive information has not surfaced. This excerpt from Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor, Volume 1 (1861) may provide some small clue. He is describing street urchins:
The boys—and nearly the whole of them— soon become very quick, and grow masters of slang, in from six weeks to two or three months. "I suppose," said one man familiar with their character, "they'd learn French as soon, if they was thrown into the way of it. They must learn slang to live, and as they have to wait at markets every now and then, from one hour to six, they associate one with another and carry on conversations in slang about the "penny gaffs" (theatres), criticising the actors; or may be they toss the pieman, if they've got any ha'pence, or else they chaff the passers by. The older ones may talk about their sweethearts; but they always speak of them by the name of 'nammow' (girls).
The boys are severe critics too (continued my informant) on dancing. I heard one say to another; 'What do you think of Johnny Millicent's new step?' for they always recognise a new step, or they discuss the female dancer's legs, and not very decently. At other times the boys discuss the merits or demerits of their masters, as to who feeds them best. I have heard one say, 'O, aint Bob stingy? We have bread and cheese!'
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Köhlers’ Violin Repository Part 1, 1881; p. 53.
Recorded sources:
See also listing at:
Alan Snyder's Cape Breton Fiddle Recordings Index [1]
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