And I miss’d the murmuring round the hives, and my boding heart beat slower.
His soul we cheer’d with meat and wine;
With woman’s craft and balsam fine
We bathed his hurts, and bound them soft,
While west the wind played through the croft,
And the low sun dyed the pinks blood red,
And, straying near the mint-flower shed,
A wild bee wantoned o’er the bed.
He told how my son, at the shepherd’s door, kept watch in Monmouth’s clothes,
While Monmouth donned the shepherd’s frock, in hope to cheat his foes.