will break promise they speak
The wordis on the spleen.
Ye shape some wile me to beguile,
And steal from me, I ween:
Then were the case worse than it was
And I more wo-begone:
For, in my mind, of all mankind
I love but you alone."

HE.
"Ye shall not nede further to drede:
I will not dispar-age
You (God defend!), sith you descend
Of so great a lin-age.
Now understand: to Westmoreland,
Which is my heritage,
I will you bring; and with a ring
By way of marri-age
I will you take, and lady make,
As shortly as I can:
Thus have ye won an earl-es son
And not a banished man."

Here may ye see, that women be
In love, meek, kind, and stable;
Let never man reprove them than,
Or call them vari-able;
But, rather, pray God that we may
To them be comfort-able,
Which sometime proveth such as he loveth,
If they be charit-able.
For sith men would that women should
Be meek to them each one;
Much more ought they to God obey,
And serve but Him alone.

ADAM BELL, CLYM OF THE CLOUGH, AND WILLIAM OF CLOUDESLIE.

THE FIRST FYTTE.

Merry it was in green for-est,
Among the leav-es green,
Where that men walk both east and west
With bows and arrows keen,
To raise the deer out of their den,
Such sights as hath oft been seen;
As by three yeomen of the North Countrey:
By them is as I mean.

The one of them hight Adam Bell,
The other Clym of the Clough,
The third was William of Cloudeslie,
An archer good enough.
They were outlawed for venison,
These three yeomen every one;
They swore them brethren upon a day,
To Ingle wood for to gone.

Now lith and listen, gentlemen,
And that of mirths love to hear:
Two of them were single men,
The third had a wedded fere.
William was the wedded man,
Much more then was his care;
He said to his brethren upon a day,
To Carlisle he would fare,

For to speak with fair Alice his wife,
And with his children three.
"By my troth," said Adam Bell,
"Not by the counsel of me:
For if ye go to Carlisle, brother,
And from this wild wood wend,
If the Justice may you take,
Your life were at an end."--

"If that I come not to-morr