"O my liege!" quoth she, "Grant your gracious favour: Dear he is to me, Though he did me wrong." The King reply'd again, 185 With a stern behaviour, "A subject he hath slain, Dye he shall ere long: Except thou canst find Any one so kind, 190 That will dye and set him free." "Noble King!" she said, "Glad am I apaid; That same person will I be. I will suffer duly, 195 I will suffer truly, For my love and husbands sake." The King thereat amazed, Though he her beauty praised, He bad from thence they should her take. It was the King's command, 201 On the morrow after She should out of hand To the scaffold go: Her husband was 205 To bear the sword before her; He must eke, alas! Give the deadly blow. He refus'd the deed; She bid him to proceed, 210 With a thousand kisses sweet. In this wofull case They did both imbrace, Which mov'd the ruffians in that place Straight for to discover 215 This concealed murder; Whereby the lady saved was. The harlot then was hanged, As she well deserved: This did vertue bring to passe. 220 WILLOW, WILLOW, WILLOW. From Percy's _Reliques_, i. 210. This is the "song of willow" from which Desdemona sings snatches in the Fourth Act of _Othello_, (Sc. 3.) The portions which occur in Shakespeare are the first stanza, and fragments of the fifth, sixth, and seventh; he also introduces a couplet which does not belong to the ballad as here given. The Second Part is very likely a separate composition. Songs upon this model or with the same burden were not infrequent. See one in Park's _Heliconia_, Part i. 132, and another in _The Moral Play of Wit and Science_, (Shakespeare Society,) p. 86. Percy gave this song from a black-letter copy in the Pepys collection, entitled _A Lover's Complaint, being forsaken of his Love_. Another version, differing principally in arrangement, is printed in the above cited publication of the Shakespeare Society, p. 126, from a MS. in the British Museum, "written about the year 1633." A poore soule sat sighing under a sicamore tree; _O willow, willow, willow!_ With his hand on his bosom, his head on his knee. _O willow, willow, willow!_ _O willow, willow, willow!_ 5 _Sing, O the greene willow shall be my garland._