They took him the King’s son Hafbur,
Swathed him in linen white,
And laid him in the earth of Christ
By Signy his delight.
O wilt thou win me then,
or as fair a maid as I be?

GOLDILOCKS AND GOLDILOCKS

It was Goldilocks woke up in the morn
At the first of the shearing of the corn.

There stood his mother on the hearth
And of new-leased wheat was little dearth.

There stood his sisters by the quern,
For the high-noon cakes they needs must earn.

“O tell me Goldilocks my son,
Why hast thou coloured raiment on?”

“Why should I wear the hodden grey
When I am light of heart to-day?”

“O tell us, brother, why ye wear
In reaping-tide the scarlet gear?

Why hangeth the sharp sword at thy side
When through the land ’tis the hook goes wide?”

“Gay-clad am I that men may know
The freeman’s son where’er I go.

The grinded sword at side I bear
Lest I the dastard’s word should hear.”

“O tell me Goldilocks my son,
Of whither away thou wilt be gone?”

“The morn is fair and the world is wide,
And here no more will I abide.”

“O Brother, when wilt thou come again?”
“The autumn drought, and the winter rain,

The frost and the snow, and St. David’s wind,
All these that were time out of mind,

All these a many times shall be
Ere the Upland Town again I see.”

“O Goldilocks my son, farewell,
As thou wendest the world ’twixt home and hell!”

“O brother Goldilocks, farewell,
Come back with a tale for men to tell!”

So ’tis wellaway for Goldilocks,
As he left the land of the wheaten shocks.

He’s gotten him far from the Upland Town,
And he’s gone by Dale and he’s gone by Down.

He’s come to the wild-wood dark and drear,
Where never the bird’s song doth he hear.

He has slept in the moonless wood and dim
With never a voice to comfort him.

He has risen up under the little light
Where the noon is as dark as the summer night.

Six days therein has he walked alone
Till his scrip was bare and his meat was done.

On the seventh morn in the mirk, mirk wood,
He saw sight that he deemed was good.

It was as one sees a flower a-bloom
In the dusky heat of a shuttered room.

He deemed the fair thing far aloof,
And would go and put it to the proof.

But the very first step he made from the place
He met a maiden face to face.

Face to face, and so close was she
That their lips met soft and lovingly.

Sweet-mouthed she was, and fair he wist;
And again in the darksome wood they kissed.

Then first in the wood her voice he heard,
As sweet as the song of the summer bird.