'This Storie herd, I cold not chuse, but smild
To think the seelie Mayd such Feares cold shake,
Yet the next Nighte, to prove such Phan'sies wild,
I kept myself untille Midnighte awake;
'Whenn as the Midnight-Houre was past, I heard
An hevie thinge come lumbering upp the Stayre;
The Tailour Vulvius to my Sights appeard—
I could not follow to my Daughter fayre.
'Next Day, untoe a Convent nighe I hied,
And found a reverend Father at his prayer;
I told him of the Wonderres I had spied,
And begged his ghostlie Counsel I may share.
'Together to Sainct Stevenn's Churche we went,
And he a Prayer on evrie Gravestone made,
Till at the Tailour Vulvius' Monument
We stopped—we broughte a Mattocke and a Spade;
'We digged the Earthe wherein the Tailour lay;
Tille at the Tailour's Coffin we arrived,
Nor there, I weene, much Labour found that Day,
For evrie Nayle was drawen and the Hinges rived.
'This Sighte was straunge—but straunger yet remaynd,
When from the Corse the cered Clothes we tore;
The Veynes seemed full of Bloud, the Lipps distained,
All dripping with my Daughter's new-suck'd gore.
'When through own Towne this Sighte we had proclaimed,
A dismall Horrour chilled our Townsmen's hartes;
The Vampyre (So our Priest the Tailour nam'd)
Their Midnight-sleeps disturbed with feaverish startes.
The Churchyardes straight were ransacked all throughout
With Pick-ax, Shovell, Mattocke, and with Spade;
But evrie Corse that we did digge thereout,
Did shewe like living Menn in Coffins laied.
'It was the Corses that our Churchyardes filled,
That did at Midnight lumberr up our Stayres;
They suck'd our Bloud, the gorie Banquet swilled,
And harrowed everie Soule with hydeous Feares.
'And nowe the Priestes burnd Incense in the Quire,
And scattered Ave-Maries o'er the Graves,
And purified the Church with lustrall Fire,
And cast all thinges prophane to Danowe's Waves.