Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/195

Rh I found the acorn on Heshbon Hill,

In the nook of a palmer's poke,

A thousand years since; here it grows!"

And they danced till the greenwood shook:

But oh! the fire, the burning fire,

The longer it burns, it but blazes the higher.

"I have won me a youth," the Elf Queen said,

"The fairest that earth may see;

This night I have won young Elph Irving

MayMy [sic] cupbearer to be.

His service lasts but for seven sweet years,

And his wage is a kiss of me."

And merrily, merrily, laughed the wild elves

Round Corrie's greenwood tree.

But oh! the fire it glows in my brain,

And the hour is gone, and comes not again.

The Queen she has whispered a secret word,

"Come hither, my Elphin sweet,

And bring that cup of the charméd wine,

Thy lips and mine to weet."

But a brown elf shouted a loud, loud shout,

"Come, leap on your coursers fleet,

For here comes the smell of some baptized flesh,

And the sounding of baptized feet."

But oh! the fire that burns, and maun burn;

For the time that is gone will never return.

On a steed as white as the new-milked milk,

The Elf Queen leaped with a bound,

And young Elphin a steed like December snow

'Neath him at the word he found.

But a maiden came, and her christened arms

She linked her brother around,

And called on God, and the steed with a snort

Sank into the gaping ground.

But the fire maun burn, and I maun quake,

And the time that is gone will no more come back.

And she held her brother, and lo! he grew

A wild bull waked in ire;

And she held her brother, and lo! he changed

To a river roaring higher;

And she held her brother, and he became

A flood of the raging fire;

She shrieked and sank, and the wild elves laughed

Till the mountain rang and mire.

But oh! the fire yet burns in my brain,

And the hour is gone, and comes not again.

"O maiden, why waxed thy faith so faint,

Thy spirit so slack and slaw?

Thy courage kept good till the flame waxed wud,

Then thy might began to thaw;