Our politick knight, on the other side,
Crept out upon the brink,
And gave the dragon such a douse, 115
He knew not what to think:
"By cock," quoth he, "say you so, do you see?"
And then at him he let fly
With hand and with foot, and so they went to't;
And the word it was, Hey boys, hey! 120
"Your words," quoth the dragon, "I don't understand";
Then to it they fell at all,
Like two wild boars so fierce, if I may
Compare great things with small.
Two days and a night, with this dragon did fight 125
Our champion on the ground;
Though their strength it was great, their skill it was neat,
They never had one wound.
At length the hard earth began to quake,
The dragon gave him a knock, 130
Which made him to reel, and straitway he thought,
To lift him as high as a rock,
And thence let him fall. But More of More-Hall,
Like a valiant son of Mars,
As he came like a lout, so he turn'd him about,135
And hit him a kick on the a...
"Oh," quoth the dragon, with a deep sigh,
And turn'd six times together,
Sobbing and tearing, cursing and swearing,
Out of his throat of leather; 140
"More of More-Hall! O thou rascàl!
Would I had seen thee never;
With the thing at thy foot, thou hast prick'd my a... gut,
And I am quite undone forever."
"Murder, murder," the dragon cry'd, 145
"Alack, alack, for grief;
Had you but mist that place, you could
Have done me no mischief."
Then his head he shaked, trembled and quaked,
And down he laid and cry'd; 150
First on one knee, then on back tumbled he,
So groan'd, kickt, s..., and dy'd.
[29], were to him gorse and birches. Other copies.
⁂ In the improved edition of the Reliques, a most extraordinary attempt to explain the foregoing burlesque as an allegory (!) is made in a "Key" appended to the ballad, and said to be "communicated by Godfrey Bosville, Esq., of Thorp, near Malton, in Yorkshire."
"Warncliff Lodge, and Warncliff Wood (vulgarly pronounced Wantley), are in the parish of Penniston, in Yorkshire. The rectory of Penniston was part of the dissolved monastery of St. Stephen's, Westminster; and was granted to the Duke of Norfolk's family: who therewith endowed an hospital, which he built at Sheffield, for women. The trustees let the impropriation of the great tithes of Penniston to the Wortley family, who got a great deal by it, and wanted to get still more: for Mr. Nicholas Wortley attempted to take the tithes in kind, but Mr. Francis Bosville opposed him, and there was a decree in favour of the modus in 37th Eliz. The vicarage of Penniston did not go along with the rectory, but with the copyhold rents, and was part of a large purchase made by Ralph Bosville, Esq., from Queen Elizabeth, in the 2d year of her reign: and that part he sold in 12th Eliz. to his elder brother Godfrey, the father of Francis; who left it, with the rest of his estate, to his wife, for her life, and then to Ralph, third son of his uncle Ralph. The widow married Lyonel Rowlestone, lived eighteen years, and survived Ralph.