About the eyes, the spear of Alleyne Roux
Slipped through his camaille and his throat; well, well!
Alleyne is paid now; your name Alleyne too?
Mary! how strange! but this tale I would tell:
For spite of all our bastides, damned Blackhead
Would ride abroad whene'er he chose to ride,
We could not stop him; many a burgher bled
Dear gold all round his girdle; far and wide
The villaynes dwelt in utter misery
'Twixt us and thief Sir Geffray; hauled this way
By Sir Bonne Lance at one time; he gone by,
Down comes this Teste Noire on another day.
And therefore they dig up the stone, grind corn,
Hew wood, draw water, yea, they lived, in short,
As I said just now, utterly forlorn,
Till this our knave and blackhead was out-fought.
So Bonne Lance fretted, thinking of some trap
Day after day, till on a time he said:
John of Newcastle, if we have good hap,
We catch our thief in two days. How? I said.
Why, Sir, to-day he rideth out again,
Hoping to take well certain sumpter mules
From Carcassonne, going with little train,
Because, forsooth, he thinketh us mere fools;
But if we set an ambush in some wood,
He is but dead: so, Sir, take thirty spears
To Verville forest, if it seem you good.
Then felt I like the horse in Job, who hears
The dancing trumpet sound, and we went forth;
And my red lion on the spear-head flapped,
As faster than the cool wind we rode north,
Towards the wood of Verville; thus it happed.
We rode a soft pace on that day, while spies
Got news about Sir Geffray: the red wine
Under the road-side bush was clear; the flies,
The dragon-flies I mind me most, did shine
In brighter arms than ever I put on;
So: Geffray, said our spies, would pass that way
Next day at sundown: then he must be won;
And so we enter'd Verville wood next day,