"Wherein her fleshe is minced small,
And parched with the fire;
All caused by her step-mother,
Who did her death desire.
"And cursed bee the master-cook,85
O cursed may he bee!
I proffered him my own heart's blood,
From death to set her free."
Then all in blacke this lord did mourne,
And for his daughters sake,90
He judged her cruell step-mother
To be burnt at a stake.
Likewise he judg'd the master-cook
In boiling lead to stand.
And made the simple scullion-boye95
The heire of all his land.
THE CRUEL BLACK.
A Collection of Old Ballads, (1723,) ii. 152: also Evans's Old Ballads, iii. 232. Entered in the Stationers' Registers, 1569-70. A writer in the British Bibliographer, (iv. 182,) has pointed out that this is only one of Bandello's novels versified. The novel is the 21st of the Third Part, (London, 1792.)
A lamentable Ballad of the tragical End of a gallant Lord and virtuous Lady; together with the untimely Death of their two Children: wickedly performed by a Heathenish and Blood-thirsty Black-a-moor, their Servant; the like of which Cruelty and Murder was never before heard of.
In Rome a nobleman did wed
A virgin of great fame;
A fairer creature never did
Dame Nature ever frame:
By whom he had two children fair,5
Whose beauty did excel;
They were their parents only joy,
They lov'd them both so well.