With Happy Hearts United

For Christmas

Words: “Faisans rejouissance,” an old Besancon patoir Noël.

English words for the tune by K. W. Simpson.
See Notes below.

Music: Bèsançon Noël

Source: Richard Runciman Terry, Two Hundred Folk Carols (London: Burns Oates & Washbourne Limited, 1933), Carol #59, pp. 4-5.

1. With happy hearts united
In gladness let us sing,
For evil is despited
And all the heavens ring.
What fearful happ'ning dread ye,
With Him at hand to lead ye?
O let your songs of mirth
Resound upon the earth.

2. Where once we walked in sorrow,
How lightly tread we now!
Nor dread that any morrow
Our hearts may overthrow!
We look ahead unfearing,
The voice of Jesus hearing;
The voice that tells us clear,
His love hath conquered Fear!

3. O sing in sounding chorus,
With happy hearts and strong!
The miracle before us
Doth merit all your song!
Come run ye, hither, thither,
And let us seek together
(Within that quiet stall),
The Babe who loves us all!

Sheet Music from Richard Runciman Terry, Two Hundred Folk Carols (London: Burns Oates & Washbourne Limited, 1933), Carol #59, pp. 4-5.

Note from Rev. Terry:

The original (patois) words of this beautiful tune are an amusing example (see Preface) of ”Devil–Baiting” which was dear to the medieval rustic. The Carol is (in substance) a “leg – pull” of Satan on his discomfiture at the birth of a Saviour. To water down its verbal horse-play would be sheer preciosity. To expect adults to sing a translation of the original would be asking of them and almost impossible feat: – to adjust their mentality to the infantile level of the yokel ”humorist” of the Middle Ages. In these circumstances it has been thought well to supply entirely new words. The original ones may be consulted in Th. Belamy's Recueil de Noels Anciens au patois de Besançon (No. 16) [Nouvelle Édition; Besançon: Imprimerie et Librairie De'Bintot, Place Saint-Pierre, 1872, pp. 72-76.].

Note:

According to this text, the air to be used is either Je suis dans la tristesse, or de Turlu, turlutu.

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