June Tabor - Cold and Raw

Cold and raw the North did blow,
Bleak in the morning early;
All the trees were hid in snow
Dagl'd by winter yearly.
Gentlemen riding o'er the heather
Met with a farmer's daughter;
Her rosy cheeks and her bonny brow
They made his mouth to water.

Quickly he saluted me,
Meaning to show his breeding;
I bowed to him right gracefully,
His courtesy exceeding.
He ask'd me where I went so soon
And longed to begin a parley.
I told him to the next market town
A-purpose to sell my barley.

“In this purse, sweet girl,” says he,
“Twenty pounds lie fairly
Seek no further one to buy
For I'll take all your barley.
Twenty more would buy delight
Your body I love so dearly,
If you would lay with me all night
And go home in the morning early.”

“If twenty pounds could buy the globe
It's this I never do, sir.
Nor were my kin as poor as Job
I wo'd not raise 'em so, sir.
If I lay with you this night
We'd get a young child together
And you'd be gone e'er the nine months end
And where should I find a father?”

He told me he had married been
Fourteen years and longer,
Or else he'd take me for his own
And tie the knot much stronger.
I bade him then no further roam
But manage his wedlock fairly;
And keep his gold for his wife at home
And some other shall have my barley.