one;
Whether I shall go to Lord Thomas's wedding,
Or whether I shall tarry at home?'

'There are many that are your friends, daughter,
And many that are your foe;
Therefore I charge you on my blessing,
To Lord Thomas's wedding don't go.'

'There's many that are my friends, mother
And if a thousand more were my foe,
Betide my life, betide my death,
To Lord Thomas's wedding I'll go.'

She clothed herself in gallant attire,
And her merry men all in green;
And as they rid through every town,
They took her to be some queen.

But when she came to Lord Thomas's gate,
She knocked there at the ring;
But who was so ready as Lord Thomas,
To let fair Ellinor in.

'Is this your bride?' fair Ellinor said;
'Methinks she looks wonderful brown;
Thou might'st have had as fair a woman,
As ever trod on the ground.'

'Despise her not, fair Ellin,' he said,
'Despise her not unto me;
For better I love thy little finger,
Than all her whole body.'

This brown bride had a little penknife,
That was both long and sharp,
And betwixt the short ribs and the long,
Prick'd fair Ellinor to the heart.

'Now Heaven save thee,' Lord Thomas he said,
'Methinks thou look'st wondrous wan:
Thou used to look with as fresh a colour,
As ever the sun shined on.'

'O, art thou blind, Lord Thomas?' she said,
'Or canst thou not very well see?
O, dost thou not see my own heart's blood
Run trickling down my knee?'

Lord Thomas he had a sword by his side;
As he walked about the hall,
He cut off his bride's head from her shoulders,
And threw it against the wall.

He set the hilt against the ground,
And the point against his heart;
There never were three lovers met,
That sooner did depart.

_Old Ballad_

CXXXII

_QUEEN MAB_

O then, I see, Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman;
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep:
Her wagon spokes made of long spinner's legs:
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces, of the smallest spider's web;
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams;
Her whip of crick