But the very first flourish, when the heralds gave command,
The sword of brave Devonshire bent backward on his hand;
In suspense he paused awhile, scanned his foe before he strake,
Then against the King’s armour, his bent sword he brake.
Then he sprang from the stage, to a soldier in the ring,
Saying, ‘Lend your sword, that to an end this tragedy we bring:
Though he’s fighting me in armour, while I am fighting bare,
Even more than this I’d venture for young Lord Delaware.’
Leaping back on the stage, sword to buckler now resounds,
Till he left the Dutch Lord a bleeding in his wounds:
This seeing, cries the King to his guards without delay,
‘Call Devonshire down,—take the dead man away!’
‘No,’ says brave Devonshire, ‘I’ve fought him as a man,
Since he’s dead, I will keep the trophies I have won;
For he fought me in your armour, while I fought him bare,
And the same you must win back, my liege, if ever you them wear.’
God bless the Church of England, may it prosper on each hand,
And also every poor man now starving in this land;
And while I pray success may crown our King upon his throne,
I’ll wish that every poor man may long enjoy his own.
LORD BATEMAN.
[This is a ludicrously corrupt abridgment of the ballad of Lord Beichan, a copy of which will be found inserted amongst the Early Ballads, An. Ed. p. 144. The following grotesque version was published several years ago by Tilt, London, and also, according to the title-page, by Mustapha Syried, Constantinople! under the title of The loving Ballad of Lord Bateman. It is, however, the only ancient form in which the ballad has existed in print, and is one of the publications mentioned in Thackeray’s Catalogue, see ante, p. 20. The air printed in Tilt’s edition is the one to which the ballad is sung in the South of England, but it is totally different to the Northern tune, which has never been published.]
Lord Bateman he was a noble lord,
A noble lord of high degree;
He shipped himself on board a ship,
Some foreign country he would go see.
He sailèd east, and he sailèd west,
Until he came to proud Turkèy;
Where he was taken, and put to prison,
Until his life was almost weary.
And in this prison there grew a tree,
It grew so stout, and grew so strong;
Where he was chainèd by the middle,
Until his life was almost gone.