Did you ever see a lassie?

Link to Wikipedia Article where it says that "Did You Ever See a Lassie" and "The More We Get Together" are the same melody. It started as a German folk song "Auch Du Lieber Augustin" which has the following lyrics:

English Translation – Auch Du Lieber Augustin

Refrain

O, you dear Augustin, Augustin, Augustin

O, you dear Augustin,

All is lost!

1. Money’s gone, girlfriend’s gone,

All is gone, all is gone.

O, you dear Augustin,

All is lost! Refrain

2. Coat is gone, staff is gone,


Augustin lies in the dirt.

O, you dear Augustin,

All is lost! Refrain

Versions from Beth's Music Notes

Recordings of O, du lieber Augustin from brief YouTube search.

The Wikipedia article about this folksong has a wild, unverified legend. (I really need to learn German to track down another source.)

 It goes as follows:

In 1679, Vienna was struck by the Great Plague and Augustin was a ballad singer and bagpiper, who toured the city's inns entertaining people. The Viennese people loved Augustin because of his charming humour in bitter times, and they called him Lieber Augustin (Dear Augustin).

According to legend,[citation needed] once he was drunk and on his way home he fell in the gutter and went to sleep. He was mistaken for a dead man by the gravediggers patrolling the city for dead bodies. They picked him up and threw him, along with his bagpipes which they presumed were infected, into a pit filled with bodies of plague victims outside the city walls. Next day when Augustin woke up, he was unable to get out of the deep mass grave. He was shocked and after a while he started to play his bagpipes, because he wanted to die the same way he lived. Finally people heard him and he was rescued. Luckily he remained healthy despite having slept with the infected dead bodies and Augustin became a symbol of hope for Viennese people.