Ballads in the Cumberland dialect :: :: University of Virginia Library

There was ill gusty Jemmy, the cocker of Codbeck,
He follow'd blin Leethet 'lass years twee or three;
She laid in o' twins, and was e'en broken-hearted,
For Jemmy had left her—and, neist, what did he,
But ran owre to Hesket, and wedded anudder;
Suin peer Greacy Leethet was laid in her grave;
The last words she spak were, ‘O God, forgi'e Jemmy!
‘I may rue the day when he stuil my heart frae me!
‘Tho' I's gawn to leave you, my innocents save!
Her twea bairns she kiss'd,
And then sunk into rest.
O but sec like fellows sud suffer!

I ne'er can forget when the corpse cross'd the lonnin,
Amang auld and young there was nit a dry e'e;

Aw whop'd she was happy—but, O man! her fadder
When they cover'd the coffin, we thought he wad dee!
He cried, ‘Ive nae comfort sin I've lost my Greacy!
O that down aseyde her my head I could lay!’
For Jemmy, de'il bin him! he's kent nought but crosses,
He's shunn'd by the lads, and he's hiss'd by the lasses,
And Greacy's Ghost haunts him by neet and by day;
Nae neybor luiks near him,
The bairns they aw fear him;
And may sec like fellows still suffer!

July 28, 1804.