http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbVmswlWN3g&feature=related
There were three men came out of the West,
Their fortunes for to try,
And these three men made a solemn vow:
John Barleycorn must die.
They've ploughed, they've sewn, they've harrowed him in,
Threw clods upon his head,
And these three men made a solemn vow:
John Barleycorn was dead.
They've let him lie for a very long time,
‛Till the rains from heaven did fall,
And little Sir John sprung up his head,
And so amazed them all.
They've let him stand ‛till midsummer's day,
‛Till he looked both pale and wan,
And little Sir John's grown a long, long beard,
And so become a man.
They've hired men with the scythes so sharp,
To cut him off at the knee,
They've rolled him and tied him by the way,
Serving him most barbarously.
They've hired men with the sharp pitchforks,
Who pricked him to the heart,
And the loader he has served him worse than that,
For he's bound him to the cart
They've wheeled him around and around the field,
‛Till they came unto a barn,
And there they made a solemn oath,
On poor John Barleycorn.
They've hired men with the crab-tree sticks,
To cut him skin from bone,
And the miller he has served him worse than that,
For he's ground him between two stones.
And little Sir John and the nut-brown bowl,
And he's brandy in the glass;
And little Sir John and the nut-brown bowl,
Proved the strongest man at last.
The huntsman, he can't hunt the fox,
Nor so loudly to blow his horn,
And the tinker he can't mend kettle nor pot,
Without a little Barleycorn
The original folk song has a number of verses that basically describe the growing process of barley, and finally it's conversion into ale. Curiously, the begining talks about 3 men and killing John Barleycorn:
There were three men, came out of the west, their fortunes for to try
And these three men made a solemn vow, John Barleycorn should die
So they harrowed him in three furrows deep, threw clods upon his head
And these three men made a solemn vow, John Barleycorn was dead
At the other end of the song:
There's little Sir John in the nut brown bowl, and there's brandy in the glass,
And little Sir John in the nut brown bowl proved the strongest man at last
The huntsman cannot hunt the fox nor loudly blow his horn
And the tinker cannot mend his pots without John Barleycorn
As I understand it, in past times when harvests were very uncertain, there were often efforts to keep the peasants from using valuable grain for beer instead of bread.
Not just in England were there laws about what grain could be used for making beer, and at what times. The famous Reinheitsgebot, the Bavarian (and then later, German) beer purity law, contains a section regarding the use of wheat, and another about when beer could be made.
This song may be a discussion of what the royalty (the three men from the west) wanted, and what the peasants wanted. Of course, before mass production of glass (early 1800s), peasants drank from wooden vessels (the nut brown bowl), and royalty would naturally prefer the aged and perhaps imported "brandy in the glass".
Since little Sir John proved the strongest at the last, one must assume that the regulations failed and beer was made anyway.