Allison Gross

[1] It tells the story of "the ugliest witch in the north country" who tries to persuade a man to become her lover and then punishes him by a transformation.

[2] The thwarted supernatural lover – nereid, fairy, elf, or troll – taking this form of revenge is a common motif; the tales are generally a variant on Beauty and the Beast, where the victim must live in that form until finding another love, as beautiful as the thwarted lover.

The first sung folk revival recording of Alison Gross was by Dave and Toni Arthur on their 1970 album Hearken to the Witches Rune (Trailer LEA 2017), three years before Steeleye Span recorded their British folk rock version on their Parcel of Rogues album.

The music Steeleye composed for it was substantially more rock-influenced than most of their more folk music-influenced recordings, and they included a chorus that was not in Child's collection.

The Steeleye Span version concludes with its narrator, having rebuffed the advances of Allison Gross numerous times, transformed into "an ugly worm".