A MERCHANTS daughter loude her brothers boy
That kept the shop, of linage basely borne,
Which grome became the damsels only ioy.
Whereat the brothers tooke no little scorne:
That he who was a youth of no account,
Presumde vnto their sisters bed to mount.
So deepely sanke disdaine within their brest,
As nought saue death their malice might assuage,
Those stately merchants mought not be at rest,
Till time they had dispatcht the sillie page:
Wherefore they all, with one consent agreed,
To murther him, and so they did in deede.
Whose absence long did grieue the tender maide,
That wept the dayes and spent the night in teares,
Not knowing where he was, nor why he stayde:
It so fell out in fine, the Ghost appeares
Amyd her dreame, of him that so was slaine,
And bid her stint her teares, that were in vaine.
He wried his wounds, he shewde the shameful blows,
He told the traytors treason, and the traine
That wroght his bane, and whence their malice rose,
And where his mangled carkasse they had laine:
Which proces tolde, he vanisht out of sight.
The wench awoke, a heaule wofull wight.
To trie the truth of what her vision spake,
She got a mate of trust, and on she hide
Vnto the place, a perfect view to take:
Where after search, the body she espide,
The body of her friend so lately dead,
Whose limmes she buried, bearing thence the head:
Which head she plasht within a Basell pot,
Well couered all with harden soyle aloft,
Her daily vse was to lament his lot,
That so was slayne: she wept and sorrowed oft:
So long, vntill her brothers stole away
The Basell pot, wherein her louer lay.
This second griefe compared to the furst,
That she (poore wench) had suffred for hir friend,
Increast her cares, and made her hart to burst,
Whose life did whole vpon the pot depend:
The merchants, when they sawe their sister ded,
For feare of lawe, in poste their countrey fled.