A minor mondagreen

[Wilson Gray]

Is anyone else familiar with the children's song, "Billy Boy"? There's
a verse in which Billy Boy states that he has

… been to see Coowife(?)
She's the joy of my life
But she's a young thing
And cannot leave her mother

For about 65 years, I've assumed that "Coowife" was one of those
fairy-tale names, like "Gawain," that simply exists. On a whim, I
googled it and W:pedia'd it and found nothing. Then it struck me that,
perhaps, I could find the song.

I did find the song, with almost no effort. And there it was:

Oh, where have you been,
Billy Boy, Billy Boy?
Oh, where have you been,
Charming Billy?

I have been to _seek a wife_,

She's the joy of my life,
But she's a young thing
And cannot leave her mother.

The song no longer makes sense. A guy goes to see a girlfriend named
"Coowife" too young to leave home and get married? So what? This kind
of thing happens all the time.

But now, he's merely "*seeking* a wife," presumably some random woman
that he has yet to find. Nevertheless, somehow, he *already* knows her
well enough to consider her "the joy of [his] life," even though she's
too young to get married!

Let well-enough alone.

 --
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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