must bring our babes
To wealth or miserie:

And if you keep them carefully,
Then God will you reward;
But if you otherwise should deal,
God will your deeds regard.
With lips as cold as any stone,
They kist their children small:
God bless you both, my children dear;
With that the tears did fall.

These speeches then their brother spake
To this sick couple there,
The keeping of your little ones,
Sweet sister, do not feare;
God never prosper me nor mine,
Nor aught else that I have,
If I do wrong your children dear,
Wheli you are laid in grave.

The parents being dead and gone,
The children home he takes,
And brings them straite unto his house,
Where much of them he makes.
He had not kept these pretty babes
A twelvemonth and a day,
But, for their wealth, he did devise
To make them both away.

He bargain'd with two ruffians strong,
Which were of furious mood,
That they should take these children young,
And slay them in a wood.
He told his wife an artful tale,
He would the children send
To be brought up in fair London,
With one that was his friend.

Away then went those pretty babes,
Rejoycing at that tide,
Rejoycing with a merry mind,
They should on cock-horse ride.
They prate and prattle pleasantly,
As they rode on the way,
To those that should their butchers be,
And work their lives' decay:

So that the pretty speech they had,
Made Murder's heart relent;
And they that undertook the deed,
Full sore did now repent.
Yet one of them, more hard of heart,
Did vow to do his charge,
Because the wretch, that hired him,
Had paid him very large.

The other won't agree thereto,
So here they fall to strife;
With one another they did fight,
About the children's life:
And he that was of mildest mood,
Did slay the other there,
Within an unfrequented wood;
The babes did quake for fear!

He took the children by the hand,
Tears standing in their eye,
And bade them straightway follow him,
And look they did not cry:
And two long miles he led them on,
While they for food complain:
Stay here, quoth he, I'll bring you bread,
When I come back again.

The pretty babes, with hand in hand,
Went wandering up and down;
But never more could see the man
Approaching from the town;
Their pretty lips with black-berries,
Were all besmear'd and dyed,
And when they saw the darksome night,
They sat them down and cryed.

Thus wandered these poor innocents,
Till death did end their grief,
In one another's arms they died,
As wanting due relief:
No burial this pretty pair
Of any man receives,
Till Robin-redbreast piously
Did cover them with leaves.

And now the heavy wrath of God
Upon their uncle fell;
Yea, fearful fiends did haunt his house,
His conscience felt an hell:
His barns were fir'd, his goods consum'd,
His lands were barren made;
His cattle died within the field,
And nothing with him stayd.

And in a voyage to Portugal
Two of his sons did die;
And to conclude, himself was brought
To want and misery:
He pawn'd and mortgaged all his land
Ere seven years came about.
And now at length this wicked act
Did by this means come out:

The fellow, that did take in hand
These children for to kill,
Was for a robbery judg'd to die,
Such was God's blessed will:
Who did confess the very truth,
As here hath been display'd:
Their uncle having died in gaol,
Where he for debt was laid.

You that executors be made, And overseers eke,
Of children that be fatherless,
And infants mild and meek;
Take you example by this thing,
And yield to each his right,
Lest God with such like misery
Your wicked minds requite.

ROBIN HOOD AND THE PINDER OF WAKEFIELD