Bevis blessed himselfe and forth yode,
And lepte out with haste full good;
And Bevis unto the dragon gone is;
And the dragon also to Bevis.
Longe, and harde was that fyght
Betwene the dragon, and that knyght:
But ever whan syr Bevis was hurt sore,
He went to the well, and washed him thore;
He was as hole as any man,
Ever freshe as whan he began.
The dragon sawe it might not avayle
Besyde the well to hold batayle;
He thought he would, wyth some wyle,
Out of that place Bevis begyle;
He woulde have flowen then awaye,
But Bevis lepte after with good Morglaye,
And hyt him under the wynge,
As he was in his flyenge, &c.
Sign. M. jv. L. j. &c.
After all, perhaps the writer of this ballad was acquainted with the above incidents only thro' the medium of Spenser, who has assumed most of them in his Faery Queen. At least some particulars in the description of the Dragon, &c. seem evidently borrowed from the latter. See book i. canto 11, where the Dragon's "two wynges like sayls—huge long tayl—with stings—his cruel rending clawes—and yron teeth—his breath of smothering smoke and sulphur"—and the duration of the fight for upwards of two days, bear a great resemblance to passages in the following ballad; though it must be confessed that these particulars are common to all old writers of romance.
Altho' this ballad must have been written early in the last century, we have met with none but such as were comparatively modern copies. It is here printed from one in Roman letter, in the Pepys collection, collated with such others as could be procured.
A description of the supposed scene of this ballad, which was communicated to the Editor in 1767, is here given in the words of the relater:—
"In Yorkshire, 6 miles from Rotherham, is a village, called Wortley, the seat of the late Wortley Montague, Esq. About a mile from this village is a lodge, named Warncliff Lodge, but vulgarly called Wantley: here lies the scene of the song. I was there about forty years ago: and it being a woody rocky place, my friend made me clamber over rocks and stones, not telling me to what end, till I came to a sort of a cave; then asked my opinion of the place, and pointing to one end, says, Here lay the dragon killed by Moor of Moor-hall: here lay his head; here lay his tail; and the stones we came over on the hill, are those he could not crack; and yon white house you see half a mile off, is Moor-hall. I had dined at the lodge, and knew the man's name was Matthew, who was a keeper to Mr. Wortley, and, as he endeavoured to persuade me, was the same Matthew mentioned in the song: In the house is the picture of the Dragon and Moor of Moor-hall, and near it a well, which, says he, is the well described in the ballad."
Since the former editions of this humorous old song were printed, the following Key to the Satire hath been communicated by Godfrey Bosville, Esq. of Thorp, near Malton, in Yorkshire; who, in the most obliging manner, gave full permission to adjoin it to the poem.
Warncliffe Lodge, and Warncliffe 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 Tythes 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 tythes 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 Q. 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, 3d son of his uncle Ralph. The widow married Lyonel Rowlestone, lived eighteen years, and survived Ralph.
This premised, the ballad apparently relates to the law-suit carried on concerning this claim of tythes made by the Wortley family. "Houses and churches, were to him geese and turkeys:" which are tytheable things, the dragon chose to live on. Sir Francis Wortley, the son of Nicholas, attempted again to take the tythes in kind: but the parishioners subscribed an agreement to defend their Modus. And at the head of the agreement was Lyonel Rowlestone, who is supposed to be one of "the Stones, dear Jack, which the Dragon could not crack." The agreement is still preserved in a large sheet of parchment, dated 1st of James I., and is full of names and seals, which might be meant by the coat of armour, "with spikes all about, both within and without." More of More-hall was either the attorney, or counsellor, who conducted the suit. He is not distinctly remembered, but More-hall is still extant at the very bottom of Wantley [Warncliff] Wood, and lies so low, that it might be said to be in a well: as the dragon's den [Warncliff Lodge] was at the top of the wood, "with Matthew's house hard by it." The keepers belonging to the Wortley family were named, for many generations, Matthew Northall: the last of them left this lodge, within memory, to be keeper to the Duke of Norfolk. The present owner of More-hall still attends Mr. Bosville's Manor-Court at Oxspring, and pays a rose a year. "More of More-hall, with nothing at all, slew the Dragon of Wantley." He gave him, instead of tythes, so small a Modus, that it was in effect nothing at all, and was slaying him with a vengeance. "The poor children three," &c. cannot surely mean the three sisters of Francis Bosville, who would have been coheiresses, had he made no will? The late Mr. Bosville had a contest with the descendants of two of them, the late Sir Geo. Saville's father, and Mr. Copley, about the presentation to Penniston, they supposing Francis had not the power to give this part of the estate from the heirs at law; but it was decided against them. The dragon (Sir Francis Wortley) succeeded better with his cousin Wordesworth, the freehold lord of the manor (for it is the copyhold manor that belongs to Mr. Bosville) having persuaded him not to join the refractory parishioners, under a promise that he would let him his tythes cheap: and now the estates of Wortley and Wordesworth are the only lands that pay tythes in the parish.