[We have seen an old printed copy of this ballad, which was written probably about the date of the event it records, 1537. Our version was taken down from the singing of a young gipsy girl, to whom it had descended orally through two generations. She could not recollect the whole of it. In Miss Strickland's Lives of the Queens of England, we find the following passage: 'An English ballad is extant, which, dwelling on the elaborate mourning of Queen Jane's ladies, informs the world, in a line of pure bathos,
In black were her ladies, and black were their faces.'
Miss Strickland does not appear to have seen the ballad to which she refers; and as we are not aware of the existence of any other ballad on the subject, we presume that her line of 'pure bathos' is merely a corruption of one of the ensuing verses.]
p. 114Queen Jane was in travail
For six weeks or more,
Till the women grew tired,
And fain would give o'er.
'O women! O women!
Good wives if ye be,
Go, send for King Henrie,
And bring him to me.'
King Henrie was sent for,
He came with all speed,
In a gownd of green velvet
From heel to the head.
'King Henrie! King Henrie!
If kind Henrie you be,
Send for a surgeon,
And bring him to me.'
The surgeon was sent for,
He came with all speed,
In a gownd of black velvet
From heel to the head.
He gave her rich caudle,
But the death-sleep slept she.
Then her right side was opened,
And the babe was set free.
The babe it was christened,
And put out and nursed,
While the royal Queen Jane
She lay cold in the dust.
* * * * *
So black was the mourning,
And white were the wands,
Yellow, yellow the torches,
They bore in their hands.
p. 115The bells they were muffled,
And mournful did play,
While the royal Queen Jane
She lay cold in the clay.
Six knights and six lords
Bore her corpse through the grounds;
Six dukes followed after,
In black mourning gownds.
The flower of Old England
Was laid in cold clay,
Whilst the royal King Henrie
Came weeping away.
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