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⟨Saying⟩, your officers greet you well,
Out of the north country.
How fares my justices, said the king,
And my sheriff also?
Sir, they be slain without leasing,
With many officers more.
Who then hath slain them, said the king?
I want that you tell me:
Adam Bell, and Clim of the Clough,
With William of Cloudeslie,
Alas! for truth then said the king,
My heart is wond’rous sore;
I had rather a thousand pounds,
I had known this before:
For I have granted them great grace,
So that for thanketh me;
But had I known all this before;
They had been hang’d all three.
The king open’d the letter anon,
Himself to read it thro’;
He found how these out-laws had slain
Three hundred men and more,
First the justice and the sheriff,
The mayor of Carlisle town ;
Of all the constables, catch poles,
In short they left not one.
The bailiffs and the beadles both,
With serjeants of the law ;
Yea forty for’sters of the see,
