The Lady and the Dwarf-King

Fair Hermeline ask'd her father dear,
The time drives on so slow
"O might I to church, a mass to hear?"
So heavy the weight of woe,

"Yes surely, my daughter, I grant thy prayer,
"But be of the mountain dwarf aware."

In purple and gold the maid was diglit,
And all her fingers with gold were bright.

Fair Hermeline went by a small green lane.
The Dwarf by the highroad across the plain

Away to his cavern he drew the maid,
And eight long years in the hill she stay'd.

She lived in his cave eight years or more,
And there to the Dwarf seven sons she bore.

Fair Hermeline came and bent her knee;
"O may I my father go and see?"

"Yes surely thou may'st to thy father go,
"But say not a word of thy fate below"

"Nay that will I not: have thou no fear,
"That any thing reach my father's ear."

Fair Hermeline came to her home once more,
Her father was standing before his door.

"O! Hermeline, answer, my child, and say,
"Where hast thou been living so many a day?"

"I've dwelt so long in a mountain cave,
"And borne to the Dwarf seven sons so brave."

"Go then to the table, my child, and eat,
["'Tis long thou hast tasted no Christian meat."

Fair Hermeline went to the board and ate,
The Dwarf knock'd loud at her father's gate.

"What is it fair Hermeline talks of me?"
"'Tis nothing at all I have said of thee.

"I say that all honour to me he shows,
"I say that his heart no malice knows."

The Dwarf on her lap gold apples threw,
[That home to the cavern his lady drew.]"

Fair Hermeline up from the table sprang,
The apples of gold they clash'd and rang.

As Hermeline came to the mountain cave,
The Dwarf on her ear a buffet gave.

As came fair Hermeline under ground,
To welcome her stood her children round.

He whipped her on with a birchen rod,
And sullen and vengeful in she trod.

Her first little boy, he brought a chair.
The second, he pray'd her be seated there.

The third to his mother the water gave,
The fourth, he pray'd her therein to lave.

The fifth with a napkin was near her side.
The sixth stood by, till her limbs were dried.

The seventh was her comfort, for he in time
Will surely avenge his father's crime.