And she, she died for pure, pure grief,

And he, he died for sorrow.

And they buried her in the chancel high,

And they buried him in the choir;

And out of her grave sprung a red, red rose,

And out of his sprung a briar.

And they grew till they grew to the church roof,

And then they couldn’t grow any higher;

So they twined themselves in a true lovers’ knot,

For all lovers true to admire.

After that they would all look thoughtfully into their mugs. Partly because the old song had saddened them, and partly because by that time the beer was getting low and the one half-pint had to be made to last until closing time. Then some would say, “What’s old Master Tuffrey up to, over in his corner there? Ain’t heard him strike up to-night”, and there would be calls for old David’s “Outlandish Knight;” not because they wanted particularly to hear it—indeed, they had heard it so often they all knew it by heart—but because, as they said, “Poor old feller be eighty-three. Let ‘un sing while he can.”

So David would have his turn. He only knew the one ballad, and that, he said, his grandfather had sung, and had said that he had heard his own grandfather sing it. Probably a long chain of grandfathers had sung it; but David was fated to be the last of them. It was out of date, even then, and only tolerated on account of his age. It ran:

An outlandish knight, all from the north lands,

A-wooing came to me,

He said he would take me to the north lands

And there he would marry me.

‘Go, fetch me some of your father’s gold

And some of your mother’s fee,

And two of the best nags out of the stable

Where there stand thirty and three.’

She fetched him some of her father’s gold

And some of her mother’s fee,

And two of the best nags out of the stable

Where there stood thirty and three.

And then she mounted her milk-white steed

And he the dapple grey,

And they rode until they came to the sea-shore,

Three hours before it was day.

‘Get off, get off thy milk-white steed

And deliver it unto me,

For six pretty maids I have drowned here

And thou the seventh shall be.’

‘Take off, take off, thy silken gown,

And deliver it unto me,

For I think it is too rich and too good

To rot in the salt sea.’

‘If I must take off my silken gown,

Pray turn thy back to me,

For I think it’s not fitting a ruffian like you

A naked woman should see.’

He turned his back towards her

To view the leaves so green,

And she took hold of his middle so small

And tumbled him into the stream.

And he sank high and he sank low