Ballads, Lyrics and Poems of Old France | Page 7

when she had time to spare;?And dreamily, dreamily all the day,?I mused on the calendar of the year,?The year so near and so far away,?When you were lief, and when I was dear.
Your memory has not had time to pass;?My youth has days of its lifetime yet;?If you only knocked at the door, alas,?My heart would open the door, Musette!?Still at your name must my sad heart beat;?Ah Muse, ah maiden of faithlessness!?Return for a moment, and deign to eat?The bread that pleasure was wont to bless.
The tables and curtains, the chairs and all,?Friends of our pleasure that looked on our pain,?Are glad with the gladness of festival,?Hoping to see you at home again;?Come, let the days of their mourning pass,?The silent friends that are sad for you yet;?The little sofa, the great wine glass -?For know you had often my share, Musette.
Come, you shall wear the raiment white?You wore of old, when the world was gay,?We will wander in woods of the heart's delight?The whole of the Sunday holiday.?Come, we will sit by the wayside inn,?Come, and your song will gain force to fly,?Dipping its wing in the clear and thin?Wine, as of old, ere it scale the sky.
Musette, who had scarcely forgotten withal?One beautiful dawn of the new year's best,?Returned at the end of the carnival,?A flown bird, to a forsaken nest.?Ah faithless and fair! I embrace her yet,?With no heart-beat, and with never a sigh;?And Musette, no longer the old Musette,?Declares that I am no longer I.
Farewell, my dear that was once so dear,?Dead with the death of our latest love;?Our youth is laid in its sepulchre,?The calendar stands for a stone above.?'Tis only in searching the dust of the days,?The ashes of all old memories,?That we find the key of the woodland ways?That lead to the place of our paradise.
THE THREE CAPTAINS.
All beneath the white-rose tree?Walks a lady fair to see,?She is as white as the snows,?She is as fair as the day:?From her father's garden close?Three knights have ta'en her away.
He has ta'en her by the hand,?The youngest of the three -?'Mount and ride, my bonnie bride,?On my white horse with me.'
And ever they rode, and better rode,?Till they came to Senlis town,?The hostess she looked hard at them?As they were lighting down.
'And are ye here by force,' she said,?'Or are ye here for play??From out my father's garden close?Three knights me stole away.
'And fain would I win back,' she said,?'The weary way I come;?And fain would see my father dear,?And fain go maiden home.'
'Oh, weep not, lady fair,' said she,?'You shall win back,' she said,?'For you shall take this draught from me?Will make you lie for dead.'
'Come in and sup, fair lady,' they said,?'Come busk ye and be bright;?It is with three bold captains?That ye must be this night.'
When they had eaten well and drunk,?She fell down like one slain:?'Now, out and alas! for my bonny may?Shall live no more again.'
'Within her father's garden stead?There are three white lilies;?With her body to the lily bed,?With her soul to Paradise.'
They bore her to her father's house,?They bore her all the three,?They laid her in her father's close,?Beneath the white-rose tree.
She had not lain a day, a day,?A day but barely three,?When the may awakes, 'Oh, open, father,?Oh, open the door for me.
''Tis I have lain for dead, father,?Have lain the long days three,?That I might maiden come again?To my mother and to thee.'
THE BRIDGE OF DEATH.
'The dance is on the Bridge of Death?And who will dance with me?'?'There's never a man of living men?Will dare to dance with thee.'
Now Margaret's gone within her bower?Put ashes in her hair,?And sackcloth on her bonny breast,?And on her shoulders bare.
There came a knock to her bower door,?And blithe she let him in;?It was her brother from the wars,?The dearest of her kin.
'Set gold within your hair, Margaret,?Set gold within your hair,?And gold upon your girdle band,?And on your breast so fair.
'For we are bidden to dance to-night,?We may not bide away;?This one good night, this one fair night,?Before the red new day.'
'Nay, no gold for my head brother,?Nay, no gold for my hair;?It is the ashes and dust of earth?That you and I must wear.
'No gold work for my girdle band,?No gold work on my feet;?But ashes of the fire, my love,?But dust that the serpents eat.'

They danced across the bridge of Death,?Above the black water,?And the marriage-bell was tolled in hell?For the souls of him and her.
LE PERE SEVERE.?KING LOUIS' DAUGHTER.?BALLAD OF THE ISLE OF FRANCE.
King Louis on his bridge is he,?He holds his daughter on his knee.
She asks a husband at his hand?That is not worth a rood of land.
'Give up your lover speedily,?Or you within the tower must lie.'
'Although I must the prison dree,?I will not change my love for thee.
'I will not change my