In my dear father's distant house, where I can dwell apart.
"There I will live a maid again, and keep my true troth
plight;
There I will rear this infant, and guard him from all sin;
Though sorrow lies between us two, he 'll be my dear delight,
And I'll be faithful to my love as I have always been."
"How can that be, my best beloved, it is the king's black will
Within that gilded basin there to see your severed head."
"Wait, wait, Count Yanno, kill me not, I have a refuge still;
The cloistered nuns will guard me, when to their cells I've