"A blood-red crofs was on his arm;

"A dragon on his breast:

“A little garter all of gold

"Was round his leg expreft.

"Three carefull nurfes we provide

"Our little lord to keep:

"One gave him fucke, one gave him food, "And one did lull to fleep.

"But lo! all in the dead of night,

"We heard a fearful found:

"Loud thunder clapt; the castle shook;

"And lightning flasht around.

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"Dead with affright at first we lay;

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"But rousing up anon,

"We ran to see our little lord: Our little lord was gone!

"But how or where we could not tell; i

"For lying on the ground,

"In deep and magic flumbers laid,

"The nurses there we found."

O grief on grief! lord Albret faid:

No more his tongue cou'd say, When falling in a deadly fwoone,

Long time he lifeless lay.

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175

At

At length reftor'd to life and fenfe

He nourisht endless woe,

No future joy his heart could taste,

No future comfort know.

So withers on the mountain top
A fair and stately oake,

Whofe vigorous arms are torne away,
By fome rude thunder-stroke.

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At length, all wearied, down in death

He laid his reverend head.

Meantime amid the lonely wilds

His little fon was bred.

There the weird lady of the woods

Had borne him far away,

And train'd him up in feates of armes,
And every martial play.

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II. ST.

II.

ST. GEORGE AND THE DRAGON.

The following ballad is given (with some corrections) from two ancient black-letter copies in the Pepys collection: one of which is in 12mo, the other in folio.

F Hector's deeds did Homer sing;

OF

And of the fack of stately Troy,

What griefs fair Helena did bring,
Which was fir Paris' only joy:

And by my pen I will recite

St. George's deeds, and English knight.

Against the Sarazens so rude

Fought he full long and many a day;

Where many gyants he fubdu'd,

In honour of the chriftian way:

And after many adventures paft
To Egypt land he came at lait.

Now, as the flory plain doth tell,

Within that countrey there did rest

A dreadful dragon fierce and fell,

Whereby they were full fore opprest:
Who by his poisonous breath each day,
Did many of the city flay.

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10

The

The grief whereof did grow fo great
Throughout the limits of the land,
That they their wife-men did intreat

To fhew their cunning out of hand;
What way they might this fiend destroy,
That did the countrey thus annoy.

The wife-men all before the king

This anfwer fram'd incontinent;

The dragon none to death might bring
By any means they could invent:

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25

His (kin more hard than brafs was found,
That sword nor fpear could pierce nor wound. 30

When this the people understood,

They cryed out most piteouslye,

The dragon's breath infects their blood,
That every day in heaps they dye;

Among them fuch a plague it bred,

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The living scarce could bury the dead.

No means there were, as they could hear,
For to appease the dragon's rage,

This thing by art the wife-men found,

Which truly must observed be;

Wherefore throughout the city round

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A virgin pure of good degree Was by the king's commiffion ftill Taken up to serve the dragon's will.

Thus did the dragon every day

Untimely crop fome virgin flowr, Till all the maids were worn away,

And none were left him to devour: Saving the king's fair daughter bright, Her father's only heart's delight.

Then came the officers to the king
That heavy meffage to declare,

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Which did his heart with forrow fting;

She is, quoth he, my kingdom's heir:

O let us all be poisoned here,

Ere she should die, that is my dear.

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Then rose the people presently,

And to the king in rage they went ;

They said his daughter dear should dye,
The dragon's fury to prevent:

Our daughters all are dead, quoth they,
And have been made the dragon's prey:

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And