48_The English and Scottish popular ballads, volume 3 (of 5)

With banquetting and merriment,

And, having usd them well,

He to their lord them safely sent,

And willd them him to tell

That if he would be pleasd at last

To beg of our good king

That he might pardon what was past,

And him to favour bring,

He would surrender backe agen

The money which before

Was taken by him and his men,

From him and many more.

Poore men might safely passe by him,

And some that way would chuse,

For well they knew that to helpe them

He evermore did use.

But where he knew a miser rich,

That did the poore oppresse,

To feele his coyne his hand did itch;

Hee’de have it, more or lesse.

And sometimes, when the high-way fayld,

Then he his courage rouses;

He and his men have oft assayld

Such rich men in their houses.

So that, through dread of Robbin then

And his adventurous crew,

The mizers kept great store of men,

Which else maintaynd but few.

King Richard, of that name the first,

Sirnamed Cuer de Lyon,

Went to defeate the Pagans curst,

Who kept the coasts of Syon.

The Bishop of Ely, chancelor,

Was left as vice-roy here,

Who like a potent emperor

Did proudly domminere.

Our chronicles of him report

That commonly he rode

With a thousand horse from court to court,

Where he would make abode.

He, riding downe towards the north,

With his aforesayd traine,

Robbin and his did issue forth,

Them all to entertaine.

And, with the gallant gray-goose wing,

They shewed to them such play,

That made their horses kicke and fling,

And downe their riders lay.

Full glad and faine the bishop was,

For all his thousand men,

To seeke what meanes he could to passe

From out of Robbins ken.

Two hundred of his men were kil’d,

And fourescore horses good;

Thirty, who did as captives yeeld,

Were carryed to the greene wood.

Which afterwards were ransomed,

For twenty markes a man;

The rest set spurres to horse, and fled

To th’ town of Warrington.

The bishop, sore enraged then,

Did, in King Richards name,

Muster a power of northerne men,

These outlawes bold to tame.

But Robbin, with his courtesie,

So wonne the meaner sort,

That they were loath on him to try

What rigor did import.

So that bold Robbin and his traine

Did live unhurt of them,

Vntill King Richard came againe

From faire Jerusalem.

And then the talke of Robbin Hood

His royall eares did fill;

His Grace admir’d that ith’ greene wood

He thus continued still.

So that the country farre and neare

Did give him great applause;

For none of them neede stand in feare,

But such as broke the lawes.

He wished well unto the king,

And prayed still for his health,

And never practised any thing

Against the common wealth.

Onely, because he was undone

By th’ crewell clergie then,

All meanes that he could thinke upon

To vexe such kinde of men

He enterprized, with hatefull spleene;

In which he was to blame,

For fault of some, to wreeke his teene

On all that by him came.

With wealth which he by robbery got

Eight almes-houses he built,

Thinking thereby to purge the blot

Of blood which he had spilt.

Such was their blinde devotion then,

Depending on their workes;

Which, if ’twere true, we Christian men

Inferiour were to Turkes.

But, to speake true of Robbin Hood,

And wrong him not a iot,

He never would shed any mans blood

That him invaded not.

Nor would he iniure husbandmen,

That toyld at cart and plough;

For well he knew, were’t not for them,

To live no man knew how.

The king in person, with some lords,

To Notingham did ride,

To try what strength and skill affords

To crush these outlawes pride.

And, as he once before had done,

He did againe proclaime,

That whosoere would take upon

To bring to Notingham,

Or any place within the land,

Rebellious Robbin Hood,

Should be preferd in place to stand

With those of noble blood.

When Robbin Hood heard of the same,

Within a little space,

Into the towne of Notingham

A letter to his Grace

He shot upon an arrow-head,

One evening cunningly;

Which was brought to the king, and read

Before his Maiestie.

The tennour of this letter was

That Robbin would submit,

And be true leigeman to his Grace,

In any thing that’s fit,

So that his Highnesse would forgive

Him and his merry men all;

If not, he must i th’ greene wood live,

And take what chance did fall.

The king would faine have pardoned him,

But that some lords did say,

This president will much condemne

Your Grace another day.

While that the king and lords did stay

Debating on this thing,

Some of these outlawes fled away

Unto the Scottish king.

For they supposd, if he were tane,

Or to the king did yeeld,

By th’ commons all the rest on ’s traine

Full quickely would be quelld.

Of more than full a hundred men

But forty tarryed still,

Who were resolvd to sticke to him,

Let fortune worke her will.

If none had fled, all for his sake

Had got their pardon free;

The king to favour meant to take

His merry men and he.

But ere the pardon to him came,

This famous archer dy’d:

His death, and manner of the same,

I’le presently describe.

For, being vext to thinke upon

His followers revolt,

In melancholly passion

He did recount their fault.

‘Perfideous traytors!’ sayd he then,

‘In all your dangers past

Have I you guarded as my men

To leave me thus at last?’

This sad perplexity did cause

A fever, as some say,

Which him unto confusion drawes,

Though by a stranger way.

This deadly danger to prevent,

He hide him with all speede

Vnto a nunnery, with intent

For his healths sake to bleede.

A faithlesse fryer did pretend

In love to let him blood;

But he by falshood wrought the end

Of famous Robbin Hood.

The fryer, as some say, did this

To vindicate the wrong

Which to the clergie he and his

Had done by power strong.

Thus dyed he by trechery,

That could not dye by force;

Had he livd longer, certainely,

King Richard, in remorse,

Had unto favour him receavd;

He brave men elevated;

’Tis pitty he was of life bereavd

By one which he so hated.

A treacherous leech this fryer was,

To let him bleed to death;

And Robbin was, me thinkes, an asse,

To trust him with his breath.

His corpes the priores of the place,

The next day that he dy’d,

Caused to be buried, in mean case,

Close by the high-way side.

And over him she caused a stone

To be fixed on the ground;

An epitaph was set thereon,

Wherein his name was found.

The date o th’ yeare, and day also,

Shee made to be set there,

That all who by the way did goe

Might see it plaine appeare

100

That such a man as Robbin Hood

Was buried in that place;

And how he lived in the greene wood,

And robd there for a space.

101

It seemes that though the clergie he

Had put to mickle woe,

He should not quite forgotten be,

Although he was their foe.

102

This woman, though she did him hate,

Yet loved his memory;

And thought it wondrous pitty that

His fame should with him dye.

103

This epitaph, as records tell,

Within this hundred yeares

By many was discerned well,

But time all things outweares.

104

His followers, when he was dead,

Were some received to grace;

The rest to forraigne countries fled,

And left their native place.

105

Although his funerall was but meane,

This woman had in minde

Least his fame should be buried cleane

From those that came behind.

106

For certainely, before nor since,

No man ere understood,

Vnder the reigne of any prince,

Of one like Robbin Hood.

107

Full thirteene yeares, and something more,

These outlawes lived thus,

Feared of the rich, loved of the poore,

A thing most marvelous.

108

A thing impossible to us

This story seemes to be;

None dares be now so venturous;

But times are chang’d, we see.

109

We that live in these latter dayes

Of civill government,

If neede be, have a hundred wayes

Such outlawes to prevent.

110

In those dayes men more barbarous were,

And lived lesse in awe;

Now, God be thanked! people feare

More to offend the law.

111

No roaring guns were then in use,

They dreampt of no such thing;

Our English men in fight did chuse

The gallant gray-goose wing.

112

In which activity these men,

Through practise, were so good,

That in those dayes non equald them,

Specially Robbin Hood.

113

So that, it seemes, keeping in caves,

In woods and forrests thicke,

Thei’d beate a multitude with staves,

Their arrowes did so pricke.

114

And none durst neare unto them come,

Unlesse in courtesie;

All such he bravely would send home,

With mirth and iollity.

115

Which courtesie won him such love,

As I before have told;

’Twas the cheefe cause that he did prove

More prosperous than he could.

116

Let us be thankefull for these times

Of plenty, truth and peace,

And leave our great and horrid crimes,

Least they cause this to cease.

117

I know there’s many fained tales

Of Robbin Hood and’s crew;

But chronicles, which seldome fayles,

Reports this to be true.

118

Let none then thinke this a lye,

For, if ’twere put to th’ worst,

They may the truth of all discry

I th’ raigne of Richard the first.

119

If any reader please to try,

As I direction show,

The truth of this brave history,

Hee’l finde it true I know.

120

And I shall thinke my labour well

Bestowed, to purpose good,

When’t shall be sayd that I did tell

True tales of Robbin Hood.

* * * * *

_At the end of the Tale_:

The Epitaph which the Prioresse of the Monastery of Kirkes Lay in

Yorke-shire set over Robbin Hood, which, as is before mentioned,

was to bee reade within these hundreth yeares, though in old

broken English, much to the same sence and meaning.

Decembris quarto die, 1198: anno regni Richardii Primi 9.

Robert Earle of Huntington

Lies under this little stone.

No archer was like him so good:

His wildnesse named him Robbin Hood.

Full thirteene yeares, and something more,

These northerne parts he vexed sore.

Such out-lawes as he and his men

May England never know agen.

Some other superstitious words were in it, which I thought fit to

leave out.[121]

Bodl. L. 78.

2^2. That _for_ which.

20^4. wisht.

59^3. kicke _for_ kickle.

70^2. In _for_ For.

94^2. Who _for_ That.

108^1. impossible _for_ unpossible.

116^3. our _for_ out.

155

SIR HUGH, OR, THE JEW’S DAUGHTER

#A.# ‘Hugh of Lincoln,’ Jamieson’s Popular Ballads, I, 151.

#B.# ‘The Jew’s Daughter,’ Percy’s Reliques, 1765, I, 32.

#C.# ‘The Jewis Daughter,’ Bishop Percy’s Papers.

#D.# ‘Sir Hugh,’ Herd’s MSS, I, 213; stanzas 7–10, II, 219. Herd’s

Scottish Songs, 1776, I, 96.

#E.# ‘Sir Hugh, or, The Jew’s Daughter,’ Motherwell’s Minstrelsy, p.

51.

#F.# A. Hume, Sir Hugh of Lincoln, p. 35.

#G.# From the recitation of an American lady.

#H.# ‘The Jew’s Daughter,’ from the recitation of an American lady.

#I.# Sir Egerton Brydges, Restituta, I, 381.

#J.# ‘Sir Hugh.’ #a.# Notes and Queries, First Series, XII, 496. #b.#

The same, VIII, 614.

#K.# Notes and Queries, First Series, IX, 320; Salopian Shreds and

Patches, in Miss C. S. Burne’s Shropshire Folk-Lore, p. 539.

#L. a.# Communicated by the Rev. E. Venables. #b.# A Walk through

Lincoln Cathedral, by the same, p. 41.

#M.# F. H. Groome, In Gipsy Tents, Edinburgh, 1880, p. 145.

#N.# ‘Little Harry Hughes and the Duke’s Daughter,’ Newell, Games and

Songs of American Children, p. 75.

#O.# G. A. Sala, Illustrated London News, LXXXI, 415, October 21,

1882, and Living London, 1883, p. 465.

#P.# Halliwell, Ballads and Poems respecting Hugh of Lincoln, p. 37,

Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales, p. 192: two stanzas.

#Q.# ‘The Jew’s Daughter,’ Motherwell’s Note-Book, p. 54: two stanzas.

#R.# ‘Sir Hew, or, The Jew’s Daughter,’ Motherwell’s Minstrelsy,

Appendix, p. xvii, VII: one stanza.

The copy in Pinkerton’s Tragic Ballads, 1781, p. 50, is made up of eight

stanzas of #D# and six of #B#, slightly retouched by the editor; that in

Gilchrist’s collection, 1815, I, 210, is eight stanzas of #D# and nine

of #A#; that in Stenhouse’s edition of Johnson’s Museum, IV, 500,

“communicated by an intelligent antiquarian correspondent,” is

compounded from #A#, #B#, #D#, #E# and Pinkerton, with a little chaff of

its own; that printed by W. C. Atkinson, of Brigg, Lincolnshire, in the

London Athenæum, 1867, p. 96, is Pinkerton’s, with two trifling changes.

Allen, History of the County of Lincoln, 1834, p. 171 (repeating Wilde,

Lincoln Cathedral, 1819, p. 27, as appears from Notes and Queries, 4th

Series, II, 60), says that a complete manuscript of the ballad was once

in the library of the cathedral, and cites the first stanza, which

differs from Pinkerton’s only in having “Mary Lincoln” for “merry

Lincoln.”

The several versions agree in the outline of the story, and in many of

the details. According to #A#, boys who are playing football are joined

by Sir Hugh, who kicks the ball through the Jew’s window. Sir Hugh sees

the Jew’s daughter looking out of the window, and asks her to throw down

the ball. She tells him to come and get it; this he is afraid to do, for

fear she may do to him “as she did to his father.” The Jew’s daughter

entices him in with an apple, leads him through nine dark doors, lays

him on a table, and sticks him like a swine; then rolls him in a cake of

lead, and throws him into a draw-well fifty fathoms deep, Our Lady’s

draw-well. The boy not returning at eve, his mother sets forth to seek

him; goes to the Jew’s castle, the Jew’s garden, and to the draw-well,

entreating in each case Sir Hugh to speak. He answers from the well,

bidding his mother go make his winding-sheet, and he will meet her at

the back of merry Lincoln the next morning. His mother makes his

winding-sheet, and the dead corpse meets her at the back of merry

Lincoln: all the bells of Lincoln are rung without men’s hands, and all

the books of Lincoln are read without man’s tongue.

The boy’s name is Sir Hugh in #A-F#, etc.; in #K# the name is corrupted

to Saluter, and in the singular and interesting copy obtained in New

York, #N#, to Harry Hughes, the Jew’s Daughter in this becoming the

Duke’s Daughter. The place is Merry Lincoln in #A#, #D#, #L# (Lincoln,

#J#; Lincolnshire, #Q#); corrupted in #B#, #C#, to Mirryland town,[122]

in #E# to Maitland town; changed to Merry Scotland, #I#, #J#, #O#, which

is corrupted to Merrycock land, #K#; in #G#, #H#, old Scotland, fair

Scotland. The ball is tossed [patted] into the Jew’s garden, #G#, #H#,

#I#, #L#, #M#, #O#, #P#, where the Jews are sitting a-row, #I#, #O#. The

boy will not come in without his play-feres, #B#, #C#, #D#, #F#, #G#,

#I#, #J#, #K#; if he should go in, his mother would cause his heart’s

blood to fall, etc., #G#, #I#, #K#.[123] The boy is rolled in a cake

[case] of lead, #A-E# (L, #b#?); in a quire of tin, #N#. The draw-well

is Our Lady’s only in #A# (L, #b#?); it is the Jew’s in #C#, #D#; it is

a [the] deep draw-well, simply, in #B#, #E#, #F#, #G#; a little

draw-well, #N#, a well, #O#; fifty fathoms deep, #A-F#, #N#; #G#,

eighteen fathoms, #O#, five and fifty feet. In #G#, the Jew’s daughter

lays the Bible at the boy’s head, and the Prayer-Book at his feet (how

came these in the Jew’s house?) before she sticks him; in #I#, #K#, the

Bible and Testament after; in #I#, the Catechism in his heart’s blood.

In #H#, the boy, at the moment of his death, asks that the Bible may be

put at his head, and the Testament at his feet, and in #M#, wants “a

seven-foot Bible” at his head and feet. In #E#, #F#, the boy makes this

request from the draw-well (“and pen and ink at every side,” #E#), and

in #N# with the variation that his Bible is to be put at his head, his

“busker” at his feet, and his Prayer-Book at his right side. In #O#

there is a jumble:

‘Oh lay a Bible at my head,

And a Prayer-Book at my feet,

In the well that they did throw me in,’ etc.

The boy asks his mother to go and make ready his winding-sheet in #A#,

#B#, #C#, #E#, #F#; and appoints to meet her at the back of the town,

#A#, #B#, #E#; at the birks of Mirryland town, #C#.

The fine trait of the ringing of the bells without men’s hands, and the

reading of the books without man’s tongue, occurs only in #A#. When

Florence of Rome approached a church, “the bellys range thorow Godys

grace, withowtyn helpe of hande:” Le Bone Florence of Rome, Ritson, Met.

Rom., III, 80, v. 1894 f. Bells which ring without men’s hands are very

common in popular tradition. See Jamieson’s Popular Ballads, I, 140;

Wunderhorn, II, 272, ed. 1808; Luzel, C. P. de la Basse-Bretagne, I, 446

f., 496 f., II, 44 f., 66 f., 308 f., 542 f.; Maurer, Isländische

Volkssagen, p. 215; Weckenstedt, Wendische Sagen, p. 379, No 5; Temme,

Volkssagen der Altmark, p. 29, No 31; Münsterische Geschichten, u. s.

w., p. 186; Bartsch, Sagen aus Meklenburg, I, 390, No 539; Mone’s

Anzeiger, VIII, 303 f., No 41 and note, and VII, 32; Birlinger, Aus

Schwaben, Neue Sammlung, I, 72; Birlinger u. Buck, I, 144, No 223, 145,

No 225, a, b, c; Schöppner, Sagenbuch der bayerischen Lande, I, 294, No

301, etc.[124]

The story of Hugh of Lincoln is told in the Annals of Waverley, under

the year 1255, by a contemporary writer, to this effect.[125] A boy in

Lincoln, named Hugh, was crucified by the Jews in contempt of Christ,

with various preliminary tortures. To conceal the act from Christians,

the body, when taken from the cross, was thrown into a running stream;

but the water would not endure the wrong done its maker, and immediately

ejected it upon dry land. The body was then buried in the earth, but was

found above ground the next day. The guilty parties were now very much

frightened and quite at their wit’s end; as a last resort they threw the

corpse into a drinking-well. Thereupon the whole place was filled with

so brilliant a light and so sweet an odor that it was clear to everybody

that there must be something holy and prodigious in the well. The body

was seen floating on the water, and, upon its being drawn up, the hands

and feet were found to be pierced, the head had, as it were, a crown of

bloody points, and there were various other wounds: from all which it

was plain that this was the work of the abominable Jews. A blind woman,

touching the bier on which the blessed martyr’s corpse was carrying to

the church, received her sight, and many other miracles followed.

Eighteen Jews, convicted of the crime, and confessing it with their own

mouth, were hanged.

Matthew Paris, also writing contemporaneously, supplies additional

circumstances, one of which, the mother’s finding of the child, is

prominent in the ballad.[126] The Jews of Lincoln stole the boy Hugh,

who was some eight years old, near Peter and Paul’s day, June 29, and

fed him properly for ten days, while they were sending to all parts of

England to convoke their co-believers to a crucifixion of him in

contempt of Jesus. When they were assembled, one of the Lincoln Jews was

appointed judge, a Pilate, as it were, and the boy was sentenced to

various torments; he was scourged till the blood ran, crowned with

thorns, spit upon, pricked with knives, made to drink gall, mocked and

scoffed at, hailed as false prophet; finally he was crucified, and a

lance thrust into his heart. He was then taken down and disembowelled;

for what reason is not known, but, as it was said, for magical purposes.

The mother (whose name, not given by this chronicler, is known to have

been Beatrice) made diligent search for her lost child for several days,

and was told by her neighbors that they had seen the boy playing with

Jewish children, and going into a Jew’s house. This house the mother

entered, and saw the boy’s body, which had been thrown into a well. The

town officers were sent for, and drew up the corpse. The mother’s

shrieks drew a great concourse to the place, among whom was Sir John of

Lexington, a long-headed and scholarly man (a priest of the cathedral),

who declared that he had heard of the Jews doing such things before.

Laying hands on the Jew into whose house the boy had been known to go,

John of Lexington told him that all the gold in England would not buy

him off; nevertheless, life and limb should be safe if he would tell

everything. The Jew, Copin by name, encouraged and urged by Sir John,

made a full confession: all that the Christians had said was true; the

Jews crucified a boy every year, if they could get hold of one, and had

crucified this Hugh; they had wished to bury the body, after they had

come to the conclusion that an innocent’s bowels were of no use for

divination, but the earth would not hold it; so they had thrown it into

a well, but with no better success, for the mother had found it, and

reported the fact to the officers. The canons of Lincoln Cathedral

begged the child’s body, and buried it in their church with the honors

due to so precious a martyr. The king, who had been absent in the North,

being made acquainted with these circumstances, blamed Sir John for the

promise which he had so improperly made the wretch Copin. But Copin was

still in custody, and, seeing he had no chance for life, he volunteered

to complete his testimony! almost all the Jews in England had been

accessory to the child’s death, and almost every city of England where

Jews lived had sent delegates to the ceremony of his immolation, as to a

Paschal sacrifice. Copin was then tied to a horse, and dragged to the

gallows, and ninety-one other Jews carried to London and imprisoned. The

inquisition made by the king’s justices showed that the crime had been

virtually the common act of the Jews of England, and the mother’s appeal

to the king, which was pressed unremittingly, had such effect that on St

Clement’s day eighteen of the richer and more considerable Jews of

Lincoln were hanged on gallows specially constructed for the purpose,

more than sixty being reserved for a like sentence in the tower of

London.[127]