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(Click on Sidebar items on right for translations, to play Colonialist compositions, or to visit his writings etc.)
Do I need to go into why the heading is appropriate? Nah! Anyway …
‘Now is the month of Maying, when merry lads are playing …’
(Sir Thomas Morley 1595)
This is possibly one of the best-known madrigals (a secular vocal music composition, usually a partsong, of the Renaissance and early Baroque eras) but is singularly inappropriate when applied to the Southern Hemisphere. We have a westerly buster busting, with attendant chill. While this did not deter young R and self from spending a short time in our puddle (not the one with waves; and J and the rest of the family abstained) it is not conducive to fa-la-las. As in the full one:
Now is the month of Maying, when merry lads are playing! Fa la la la la!
Each with his bonny lass, a-dancing on the grass, fa la la la la!
The Spring, clad all in gladness, doth laugh at Winter’s sadness! Fa la la la la!
And to the bagpipes’ sound, the nymphs tread out the ground! Fa la la la la!
Fie! Then why sit we musing, youth’s sweet delight refusing? Fa la la la la!
Say, dainty nymphs and speak! Shall we play barley break? Fa la la la la!
(As I know it, each should end with another Fa la la la la la la; fa la la la la-a.)
I deeply envy the ones entering into the bonny lass and nymphs period! Wouldn’t mind learning barley break, either – whatever that may be …
(Oh, I looked it up – seems great fun, but the trouble is that one needs a field of barley. A great thing about it is that it is played with mixed-sex couples! The ones in the middle, with linked hands, try to stop the others from passing. It seems to have some relation to a game called ‘Hasie’ [hare] I played in my youth.)
Anyway, I wanted to show one of R’s several million birthday presents – oh, how spoilt these kids are! – one she seems particularly chuffed with. It is a camera capable of carrying on clicking up to 3 metres below the surface of her natural element of water.
Colonialist's Blog 
What a great camera! I love the photo, did she take it herself?
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No, her mom took that one! She has taken hundreds now, though.
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I love little R’s face! What a super camera
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I remember singing the madrigal in my youth, Col, in a garden somewhere near Beaulieu. It brings back memories. Gorgeous photo!
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Just the right sort of spot for singing them, particularly in the merry merry month of May!
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Great shot of R 🙂
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Happy Birthday to your little Olympian! 🙂
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Can R take us a nice pic of her deep diving Grandpa? Changing the subject, Jock took some super pix of a whale shark at -5metres with one of those cheapo cardboard cameras.
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What a cool shot.
A whole new photographic portfolio awaits if you can persuade Granddaughter it is imperative her gramps get lots of practice with here new pressie! 😉
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Kids do manage to get their own way, one way or another.
Could a barley break be a pint of ale?
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That would work, for me!
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Oh yes for the camera and the photographer and the model!
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Where are the technology going to go? An underwater camera? WOW!!!
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She really is a water baby! Next Penny Heyns in the making?
I would also like to inform you that 12 May is Limerick Day so I’m expecting some great Colonialist masterpieces that day 🙂
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I must remember that – I love them. Wrote two for another blog today.
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I’ll make sure that I remind you to write a couple for us
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I like that camera…
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I am definitely jealous, myself!
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What an exceedingly cool gift!
My husband and I met on May eve – eleven years ago last night. We were at uni in oxford where may even has a big, bizarre tradition attached to it (you stay up all night drinking then gather on a bridge and listen to the Magdalen choir boys sing and somebody give a recital in Latin, which Tom kindly translated for us because he is too clever for his own good. Oh and people jump in the river. ANd sometimes die. It’s a werid night!
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You May well say that!
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You and Tom would get on well – you could bond over your mutual love of puns!
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She certainly earned that camera, little fish that she is. 🙂 Happy Birthday to your little star. xx
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Thanks!
I think she’s already well on her way to filling the memory card in it!
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What a fab toy…..I want one too…endless hours of fun 🙂
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The process of being in the element where it operates is a bit more uncomfortable in your area!
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Well we do have heated swimming pools….and then of course there are dry suits for the sea 🙂 I learned to scuba off the East Coast of Scotland (St Abbs ) and am still alive to tell the tale!
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Suits certainly help. Sailboarding in the Lake District in late Autumn taught me that.
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will you adopt me so that I can have an underwater camera x
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I am deeply (up to 3 metres, anyway) envious, myself!
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;p
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