17 'O I'le have none of your gold,' she said,
'Nor I'le have none of your fee;
But I must have your fair body
The king hath given me.'
18 Sweet William ran and fetcht her then
Five hundred pound in gold,
Saying, Fair maid, take this unto thee;
Thy fault will never be told.
19 ''T is not your gold that shall me tempt,'
These words then answered she,
'But I must have your own body;
So the king hath granted me.'
20 'Would I had drank the fair water
When I did drink the wine,
That ever any shepherd's daughter
Should be a fair lady of mine!
21 Would I had drunk the puddle-water
When I did drink the ale,
That ever any shepherd's daughter
Should have told me such a tale!'
22 'A shepheard's daughter as I was,
You might have let me be;
I'd never come to the king's fair court
To have craved any love of thee.'
23 He set her on a milk-white steed,
And himselfe upon a gray;
He hung a bugle about his neck,
And so they rode away.
24 But when they came unto the place
Where marriage rites were done,
She provd her self a duke's daughter,
And he but a squire's son.
25 'Now you have married me, sir knight,
Your pleasures may be free;
If you make me lady of one good town,
I'le make you lord of three.'
26 'Accursed be the gold,' he said,
'If thou hadst not bin true,
That should have parted thee from me,
To have chang'd thee for a new.'