Page:Three new songs.pdf/2

 

YOU beautiful ladies great and small,

Give ear unto me one and all.

And I will let you understand,

What I have suffered in this land.

I was by birth a lady fair,

My father’s chief and only heir,

And when my fond old father died,

Then I was made a knight’s young bride.

My love he built to me a bower,

Bedeck’d with many a fragrant flower,

A braver bower you ne’er did see,

Than my true-love did build for me.

But there came thieves late in the night,

They broke my bower and slew my knight;

And after that my knight was slain,

No longer there I could remain.

My servants all from me did flee

in midst of my ex remityextremity [sic],

And left me by myself alone,

With a heart as cold as any stone.

Yet though my heart was full of care,

Heaven would not suffer me to despair

So then in haste I changed my name,

fair Helen to fair William.