"
Here went there up a shout of glee.
Cried Robin: "O sweet Fool,
I would I had been there to see
This haughty lord of high degree
In pretty, plashing pool."
Here shout of glee became a roar,
That made the dungeon ring;
They laughed, they rolled upon the floor,
Till suddenly the massy door
On creaking hinge did swing;
And to them the head jailer now appeared,
A sombre man who sighed through tangled beard.
"How now, rogue-lads," said he, "grow ye merry in sooth by reason o' this
Fool! Aye me, all men do grow merry save only I, Ranulph, Chief Torturer,
Ranulph o' the Keys, o' the Gibbet, o' the City Axe--poor Ranulph the
Headsman. Good lack! I've cut off the head o' many a man merrier than I--
aye, that have I, and more's the pity! And now, ye that are to die so soon
can wax joyous along o' this motley Fool! Why, 't is a manifest good Fool,
and rare singer o' songs, 't is said, though malapert, with no respect for
his betters and over-quick at dagger-play. So 't is a Fool must die and
sing no more, and there's the pity on't for I do love a song, I--being a
companionable soul and jovial withal, aye, a very bawcock of a boy, I.
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