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The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees |
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The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon the cloudy seas |
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The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor |
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A highwayman came riding, riding, riding |
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A highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door |
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He'd a French cocked hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin |
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A coat of claret velvet and breeches of brown doe-skin |
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They fitted with never a wrinkle his boots were up to the thigh |
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And he rode with a jeweled with a twinkle, his pistol butts a-twinkle |
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His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky |
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And over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn yard |
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And he tapped with his whip on the shutters but all was locked and barred |
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He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there |
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But the landlord's black-eyed daughter, Bess, the landlord's daughter |
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Plaiting a long red love-knot into her long black hair |
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"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight |
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But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light |
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Yet if they press me sharply and harry me through the day |
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Then look for me by the moonlight, watch for me by the moonlight |
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I'll come to thee by the moonlight, though hell should bar the way |
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He rose upright in the stirrups, he scarce could reach her hand |
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She loosened her hair in the casement, his face burnt like a brand |
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As the black cascade of the perfume came tumbling over his breast |
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And he kissed its waves in the moonlight, oh, sweet waves in the moonlight |
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He tugged at his rein in the moonlight and galloped away to the west |
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He did not come at the dawning, he did not come at noon |
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And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon |
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When the road was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor |
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A red-coat troop came marching, marching, marching |
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King George's men came marching, up to the old inn door |
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They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead |
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They gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of a narrow bed |
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Two of them knelt at a casement, with muskets at their side |
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There was death at every window, hell at one dark window |
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For Bess could see, through the casement, the road that he would ride |
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They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest |
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And they had bound a musket beside her |
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With the barrel beneath her breast |
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"Now keep good watch" and they kissed her |
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She heard the dead man say, "Look for me by the moonlight |
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Watch for me by the moonlight, I'll come to thee by the moonlight |
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Though hell should bar the way" |
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She twisted her hands behind her, but all the knots held good |
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She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood |
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They stretched and strained in the darkness |
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And the hours crawled by like years |
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Till, now, on the stroke of midnight, cold, on the stroke of midnight |
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The tip of one finger touched it, the trigger at least was hers |
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Tlot-tlot, had they heard it? The horses hoofs ring clear |
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Tlot-tlot, in the distance, were they deaf they did not hear? |
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Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill |
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The highwayman came riding, riding, riding |
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The red-coats looked to the priming, she stood up straight and still |
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Tlot in the frosty silence, tlot, in the echoing night |
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Nearer came and nearer, her face was like a light |
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Her eyes grew wide for a moment, she drew one last deep breath |
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Her finger moved in the moonlight, her musket shattered the moonlight |
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Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him with her death |
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He turned, he spurred to the west, he did not know she stood |
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Bowed with her head o'er the musket, drenched with her own red blood |
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Not till the dawn had he heard it, his face grew gray to hear |
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How Bess, the landlord's daughter |
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The landlord's [Incomprehensible] daughter |
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Had watched for her love in the moonlight and died in the darkness there |
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And back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky |
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With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high |
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Blood-red were the spurs in the gold moon, wine-red was his velvet coat |
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When they shot him down on the highway, down like a dog on the highway |
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And he lay in his blood on the highway with the bunch of lace at his throat |
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Still on a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees |
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When the moon is a ghostly galleon, tossed upon the cloudy seas |
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When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor |
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A highwayman comes riding, riding, riding |
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A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn door |