The fryar of orders gray

It was a friar of orders gray,

Walkt forth to tell his beades;

And he met with a lady faire,

Clad in a pilgrime's weedes.

Now Christ thee save, thou reverend friar,

I pray thee tell to me,

If ever at yon holy shrine

My true love thou didst see.

And how should I know your true love

From many another one?

O by his cockle hat and staff

And by his sandal shoone.

O lady, he is dead and gone!

Lady, he's dead and gone!

And at his head a green grass turfe,

And at his heels a stone.

Weep no more, lady, weep no more,

Thy sorrowe is in vaine:

For violets pluckt the sweetest showers

Will ne'er make grow againe.

Yet stay, fair lady, rest awhile

Beneath this cloyster wall:

See through the hawthorn blows the cold wind,

And drizzly rain doth fall.

O stay me not, thou holy friar,

O stay me not, I pray;

No drizzly rain that falls on me

Can wash my fault away.