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27

Offended with my question, in full choir, I answered: The all-potent, sole, imAnswered, "To find thy God thou must look higher."

I asked the heavens, sun, moon, and
stars; but they
Said, "We obey

The God thou seekest." I asked what
eye or ear

Could see or hear,-

What in the world I might descry or know

Above, below; With an unanimous voice, all these things said, "We are not God, but we by him were made."

HENRY KING.

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mense,

Surpassing sense;

Unspeakable, inscrutable, eternal,
Lord over all;

The only terrible, strong, just, and true,
Who hath no end, and no beginning
know.

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When any need to borrow aught,

We lend them what they do require:
And for the use demand we naught;
Our own is all we do desire.
If to repay
They do delay,

Abroad amongst them then I go,
And night by night,
I them affright,

With pinchings, dreams, and ho, ho,
ho!

When lazy queans have naught to do,
But study how to cog and lie;
To make debate and mischief too,
"Twixt one another secretly:

1 mark their gloze,

I get me gone,

And leave them scolding, ho, ho, ho!

When men do traps and engines set

In loopholes, where the vermin creep, Who from their folds and houses get

And it disclose

The lady stood on her castle wa',
Beheld baith dale and down;

To them whom they have wrongéd so: There she was aware of a host of men
When I have done

Came riding towards the town.

Their ducks and geese, and lambs and sheep;

I spy the gin,

And enter in,

And seem a vermin taken so;

But when they there
Approach me near,

I leap out laughing, ho, ho, ho!

By wells and rills, in meadows green,
We nightly dance our heyday guise;
And to our fairy king and queen,
We chant our moonlight minstrelsies.
When larks 'gin sing,
Away we fling;

And babes new-born steal as we go;
And elf in bed
We leave in stead,

And wend us laughing ho, ho, ho!

From hag-bred Merlin's time, have I

Thus nightly revelled to and fro; · And for my pranks men call me by The name of Robin Goodfellow. Fiends, ghosts, and sprites, Who haunt the nights,

The hags and goblins do me know;
And beldames old

UNKNOWN.

[Before 1649-]

My feats have told,

So vale, vale; ho, ho, ho!

EDOM O' GORDON.

IT fell about the Martinmas,

When the wind blew shrill and cauld, Said Edom o' Gordon to his men, "We maun draw to a hauld.

"And whatna hauld sall we draw to,
My merry men and me?

We will gae to the house of the Rodes,
To see that fair ladye."

"O see ye not, my merry men a',
O see ye not what I see?
Methinks I see a host of men;
I marvel who they be."

She weened it had been her lovely lord,
As he cam' riding hame;

It was the traitor, Edom o' Gordon,
Wha recked nor sin nor shame.

She had nae sooner buskit hersell,
And putten on her gown,
Till Edom o' Gordon an' his men
Were round about the town.

They had nae sooner supper set,

Nae sooner said the grace,
But Edom o' Gordon an' his men
Were lighted about the place.

The lady ran up to her tower-head,
As fast as she could hie,
To see if by her fair speeches
She could wi' him agree.

"Come doun to me, ye lady gay,

Come doun, come doun to me;
This night sall ye lig within mine arms,
To-morrow my bride sall be."

"I winna come down, ye fause Gordon,
I winna come down to thee;
I winna forsake my ain dear lord, -
And he is na far frae me."

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