English and Scottish Ballads, Volume II

Ballads, English -- England -- Texts; Ballads, Scots -- Scotland -- Texts

"Lie still, lie still a little wee while,                         45
      Lie still but if we may;
    Gin my mother should miss us when she wakes,
      She'll gae mad ere it be day."

           *       *       *       *       *

    O it's they've taen up their mother's mantil,
      And they've hung it on a pin:                                   50
    "O lang may ye hing, my mother's mantil,
      Ere ye hap us again."




CHILDE VYET.


First printed in a complete form in Maidment's _North Countrie
Garland_, p. 24. The same editor contributed a slightly different
copy to Motherwell's _Minstrelsy_, (p. 173.) An inferior version is
furnished by Buchan, i. 234, and Jamieson has published a fragment
on the same story, here given in the Appendix.

    Lord Ingram and Childe Vyet,
      Were both born in ane bower,
    Had both their loves on one Lady,
      The less was their honour.[L4]

    Childe Vyet and Lord Ingram,                                       5
      Were both born in one hall,
    Had both their loves on one Lady
      The worse did them befall.

    Lord Ingram woo'd the Lady Maiserey,
      From father and from mother;                                    10
    Lord Ingram woo'd the Lady Maiserey,
      From sister and from brother.

    Lord Ingram wooed the Lady Maiserey,
      With leave of all her kin;
    And every one gave full consent,                                  15
      But she said no, to him.

    Lord Ingram wooed the Lady Maiserey,
      Into her father's ha';
    Childe Vyet wooed the Lady Maiserey,
      Among the sheets so sma'.                                       20

    Now it fell out upon a day,
      She was dressing her head,
    That ben did come her father dear,
      Wearing the gold so red.

    "Get up now, Lady Maiserey,                                       25
      Put on your wedding gown,
    For Lord Ingram will be here,
      Your wedding must be done!"

    "I'd rather be Childe Vyet's wife,
      The white fish for to sell,                                     30
    Before I were Lord Ingram's wife,
      To wear the silk so well!

    "I'd rather be Childe Vyet's wife,
      With him to beg my bread,
    Before I'd be Lord Ingram's wife,                                 35
      To wear the gold so red.

    "Where will I get a bonny boy,
      Will win gold to his fee,
    Will run unto Childe Vyet's ha',
      With this letter from me?"                                      40

    "O here, I am the boy," says one,
      "Will win gold to my fee,
    And carry away any letter,
      To Childe Vyet from thee."

    And when he found the bridges broke,                              45
      He bent his bow and swam;
    And when he found the grass growing,
      He hasten'd and he ran.

Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.

English and Scottish Ballads, Volume II

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