Page:Wandering young gentlewoman, or, Cat-skin's garland.pdf/2



E fathers and mothers and children also,

Come draw near untome, & soon you shall know,

The sense of my ditty for I dare to say,

The like han’t been printed this many a day.

The subject which to you I am to relate,

It is of a squire’s son of a vast estate,

And the first dear infant-his wife to him bare,

It was a young daughter of beauty most fair.

He said to his wife had this child beez a boy,

’Twould have pleas’d me better & increas’d my joy,

If the next be of the same sort, I declare

Of what I’m possest, she shall have no share.

In twelve months time after, this woman we hear,

Had another daughter of beauty most clear,

And when that her husband knew ’twas a female,

Into a strong bitter passion he fell.

Saying, since this is of the same sort as the first,

In my habitation she shall not be nurst,

Pray let it be sent into the country,

For where I am truly, this child shall not be.

With tears his dear wife, to him thus did say,

Husband, be contented, I’ll send her away,

Then unto the country with speed did it send,

For to be brought up with one who was a friend.

Although that her father he hated her so,

She good education on her did bestow,

And with a golden locket and robes of the best,

This slighted young damsel was commonly drest.

And when unto stature this damsel was grown,

And found by her father the had no love shown,

She cry’d, Before that I lie under this frown,

Im fully resolv’d to range the world round.