Christ! It was mid spring,

When first I joined the little army there
With ten good spears; Auvergne is hot, each day
We sweated armed before the barrier;
Good feats of arms were done there often. Eh?

Your brother was slain there? I mind me now,
A right good man-at-arms, God pardon him!
I think 'twas Geffray smote him on the brow
With some spiked axe, and while he totter'd, dim

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,

In the afternoon; through it the highway