| O BRIGNALL banks are wild and fair, | |
| And Greta woods are green, | |
| And you may gather garlands there | |
| Would grace a summer-queen. | |
| And as I rode by Dalton Hall | 5 |
| Beneath the turrets high, | |
| A Maiden on the castle wall | |
| Was singing merrily: | |
| "O Brignall banks are fresh and fair, | |
| And Greta woods are green; | 10 |
| I'd rather rove with Edmund there | |
| Than reign our English queen." | |
| |
| "If, Maiden, thou wouldst wend with me, | |
| To leave both tower and town, | |
| Thou first must guess what life lead we | 15 |
| That dwell by dale and down. | |
| And if thou canst that riddle read, | |
| As read full well you may, | |
| Then to the greenwood shalt thou speed | |
| As blithe as Queen of May." | 20 |
| Yet sung she, "Brignall banks are fair, | |
| And Greta woods are green; | |
| I'd rather rove with Edmund there | |
| Than reign our English queen. | |
| |
| "I read you, by your bugle-horn | 25 |
| And by your palfrey good, | |
| I read you for a ranger sworn | |
| To keep the king's greenwood." | |
| "A ranger, lady, winds his horn, | |
| And 'tis at peep of light; | 30 |
| His blast is heard at merry morn, | |
| And mine at dead of night." | |
| Yet sung she, "Brignall banks are fair, | |
| And Greta woods are gay; | |
| I would I were with Edmund there | 35 |
| To reign his Queen of May! | |
| |
| "With burnish'd brand and musketoon | |
| So gallantly you come, | |
| I read you for a bold dragoon | |
| That lists the tuck of drum." | 40 |
| "I list no more the tuck of drum, | |
| No more the trumpet hear; | |
| But when the beetle sounds his hum | |
| My comrades take the spear. | |
| And, oh! though Brignall banks be fair | 45 |
| And Greta woods be gay, | |
| Yet mickle must the maiden dare | |
| Would reign my Queen of May! | |
| |
| "Maiden! a nameless life I lead, | |
| A nameless death I'll die; | 50 |
| The fiend whose lantern lights the mead | |
| Were better mate than I! | |
| And when I'm with my comrades met | |
| Beneath the greenwood bough, | |
| What once we were we all forget, | 55 |
| Nor think what we are now." | |
| |
Chorus
Yet Brignall banks are fresh and fair, | |
| And Greta woods are green, | |
| And you may gather garlands there | |
| Would grace a summer-queen. | 60 |
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