“Beautiful Star (Star of the Evening)”

Description

"Beautiful star in heav'n so bright, Softly falls thy silvr'y light, As thou movest from earth afar, Star of the evening, beautiful star. Beautiful star, Beautiful star, Star of the evening, beautiful star." The singer asks the star to watch over his love

Notes

This obviously isn't a folk song, but there are slight hints of it in oral tradition -- including the fact that the Liddell sisters sang it for Lewis Carroll. Which inspired its far more famous parody (which is the reason I list it here): Carroll used it as the basis for "Beautiful Soup" ("Soup of the evening, Beautiful Soup"), as sung by the Mock Turtle.

How much more famous? _Granger's Index to Poetry_ has two references to "Beautiful Star." Both are books of parodies linking it to "Beautiful Soup" -- which has *five* entries in Granger's.

For further details, one may consult Martin Gardner's _The Annotated Alice_, p. 141. - RBW

Broadsides

• Bodleian, Harding B 11(4352), "Beautiful Star," H. Such (London), 1849-1862; same (?) sheet as Harding B 11(4352); also Harding B 19(10), "Beautuful (sic.) star! in heaven so bright " [another trimmed version as 2806 b.9(272), another as 2806 c.15(96)]; Harding B 11(4067), "Beautiful Star," J. Harkness (Preston), 1840-1866; same (?) sheet as Harding B 11(4068); Firth b.26(74); Harding B 11(1669); 2806 c.13(81), "Beautiful Star," James Lindsay (Glasgow), after 1851

References

1. Roud #13751
2. BI, nnBeaStar