| |
| THEY shot him dead at the Nine-Stone Rig, | |
| Beside the Headless Cross, | |
| And they left him lying in his blood, | |
| Upon the moor and moss. * * * * * | |
| They made a bier of the broken bough, | 5 |
| The sauch and the aspin gray, | |
| And they bore him to the Lady Chapel, | |
| And waked him there all day. | |
| |
| A lady came to that lonely bower, | |
| And threw her robes aside, | 10 |
| She tore her ling [long] yellow hair, | |
| And knelt at Barthram’s side. | |
| |
| She bathed him in the Lady-Well | |
| His wounds so deep and sair, | |
| And she plaited a garland for his breast, | 15 |
| And a garland for his hair. | |
| |
| They rowed him in a lily-sheet, | |
| And bare him to his earth, | |
| And the Gray Friars sung the dead man’s mass, | |
| As they passed the Chapel Garth. | 20 |
| |
| They buried him at [the mirk] midnight, | |
| When the dew fell cold and still, | |
| When the aspin gray forgot to play, | |
| And the mist clung to the hill. | |
| |
| They dug his grave but a bare foot deep, | 25 |
| By the edge of the Ninestone Burn, | |
| And they covered him o’er with the heather-flower, | |
| The moss and the Lady fern. | |
| |
| A Gray Friar staid upon the grave, | |
| And sang till the morning tide, | 30 |
| And a friar shall sing for Barthram’s soul, | |
| While the Headless Cross shall bide. | |
| |
