[In the Collection of Old Ballads, 1723 (vol. i. p. 138) there is a ballad on the same subject as the following popular one. It is entitled "Cupid's Revenge, or an account of a king who slighted all women, and at length was constrained to marry a beggar, who proved a fair and virtuous queen.">[
I read that once in Affrica
A princely wight[817] did raine,
Who had to name Cophetua,
As poets they did faine:
From natures lawes he did decline,5
For sure he was not of my mind,
He cared not for women-kinde,
But did them all disdaine.
But, marke, what hapned on a day,
As he out of his window lay,10
He saw a beggar all in gray,
The which did cause his paine.
The blinded boy, that shootes so trim,[818]
From heaven downe did hie;
He drew a dart and shot at him,15
In place where he did lye:
Which soone did pierse him to the quicke,
And when he felt the arrow pricke,
Which in his tender heart did sticke,
He looketh as he would dye.20
What sudden chance is this, quoth he,
That I to love must subject be,
Which never thereto would agree,
But still did it defie?
Then from the window he did come,25
And laid him on his bed,
A thousand heapes of care did runne
Within his troubled head:
For now he meanes to crave her love,
And now he seekes which way to proove30
How he his fancie might remoove,
And not this beggar wed.
But Cupid had him so in snare,
That this poor begger must prepare
A salve to cure him of his care,35
Or els he would be dead.
And, as he musing thus did lye,
He thought for to devise
How he might have her companye,
That so did 'maze his eyes.40
In thee, quoth he, doth rest my life;
For surely thou shalt be my wife,
Or else this hand with bloody knife
The Gods shall sure suffice.
Then from his bed he soon arose,45
And to his pallace gate he goes;
Full little then this begger knowes
When she the king espies.
The gods preserve your majesty,
The beggers all gan cry:50
Vouchsafe to give your charity
Our childrens food to buy.
The king to them his pursse did cast,
And they to part it made great haste;
This silly woman was the last55
That after them did hye.
The king he cal'd her back againe,
And unto her he gave his chaine;
And said, With us you shal remaine
Till such time as we dye:60