P. 279. The following version is printed by Mr. G.R. Tomson in
his Ballads of the North Countrie, 1888, p. 434, from a
Manuscript of Mrs. Rider Haggard.
| 1 |
Giles Collins said to his own mother,
'Mother, come bind up my head,
And send for the parson of our parish,
For to-morrow I shall be dead. |
| 2 |
'And if that I be dead,
As I verily believe I shall,
O bury me not in our churchyard,
But under Lady Annice's wall.' |
| 3 |
Lady Annice sat at her bower-window,
Mending of her night-coif,
When passing she saw as lovely a corpse
As ever she saw in her life. |
| 4 |
'Set down, set down, ye six tall men,
Set down upon the plain,
That I may kiss those clay-cold lips
I neer shall kiss again. |
| 5 |
'Set down, set down, ye six tall men,
That I may look thereon;
For to-morrow, before the cock it has crowd,
Giles Collins and I shall be one. |
| 7 |
'What had you at Giles Collins's burying?
Very good ale and wine?
You shall have the same to-morrow night,
Much about the same time.' |
| 7 |
Giles Collins died upon the eve,
This fair lady on the morrow;
Thus may you all now very well know
This couple died for sorrow. |
Lt-Col. Prideaux has sent me this copy, from Fly-Leaves,
London, John Miller, 1854, Second Series, p. 98.
| 1 |
Lady Annis she sat in her bay-window,
A-mending of her night-coif;
As she sat, she saw the handsomest corpse
That ever she saw in her life. |
| 2 |
'Who bear ye there, ye four tall men?
Who bear ye on your shouldyers?'
' It is the body of Giles Collins,
An old true lovyer of yours.' |
| 3 |
'Set 'n down, set 'n down,' Lady Annis she said,
'Set 'n down on the grass so trim;
Before the clock it strikes twelve this night,
My body shall lie beside him.' |
| 4 |
Lady Annis then fitted on her night-coif,
Which fitted her wondrous well;
She then pierced her throat with a sharp-edgd knife,
As the four pall-bearers can tell. |
| 5 |
Lady Annis was buried in the east church-yard,
Giles Collins was laid in the west,
And a lily grew out from Giles Collins's grave
Which touched Lady Annis's breast. |
| 6 |
There blew a cold north-westerly wind,
And cut this lily in twain;
Which never there was seen before,
And it never will again. |
