Читать книгу Story-Telling Ballads. Selected and Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the Boys' and Girls' Own Reading онлайн

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Wi’ ever a living man;

Never a wight in Cumbernauld

Could beat him at the span.

But Thirlwall’s Baron heeded not

The word o’ Belted Will,

Who dwells within the dark Naworth,

The Border March to still;

He can rule all the Border round,

Wi’ a peeled willow-wand;

But Thirlwall’s Baron gecks at him,

And all the laws o’ the land.

So fast come tidings of ravin wrong

To Belted Willy’s ear;

Quo’ he, “By my belt, I’ll trap this man,

If I catch him in effeir.

“But he is like a wily fox,

That taketh to his hole,

An I can catch him on the turn,

I’ll smoke him from his bole.

“He reaves and harrows every one,

Tho’ he has goups o’ gold;

I’ll lay a trap for him bedeen,

By which he shall be sold.”

Thirlwall’s Baron heard his speech,

Wi’ scorn almost he burst;

“His anger it is like a haggis,

That’s hottest at the first.”

Sore smiled the wily Belted Will,

But in so dark a way;

Better that smile were wanting there,

Than on his lip to lay.

Jock o’ the Sheugh tirled at the string,

Of the Baron of Thirlwall’s yett;