For to see Mad Tom of Bedlam
Ten thousand miles I travelled
Mad Maudlin goes on dirty toes
For to save her shoes from gravel.
- ''Still will I sing bonny boys, bonny mad boys
- Bedlam boys are bonny
- For they all go bare and they live by the air
- And they want no drink or money.''
I now repent that ever
Poor Tom was so disdain-ed
My wits are lost since him I crossed
Which makes me thus go chained
I went down to Satan's kitchen
For to get me food one morning
And there I got souls piping hot
All on the spit a-turning
There I took up a caldron
Where boiled ten thousand harlots
Though full of flame I drank the same
To the health of all such varlets
So drink to Tom of Bedlam
Go fill the seas in barrels
I'll drink it all, well brewed with gall
And maudlin drunk I'll quarrel
My staff has murdered giants
My bag a long knife carries
For to cut mince pies from children's thighs
And feed them to the fairies
The spirits white as lightening
Would on me travels guide me
The stars would shake and the moon would quake
Whenever they espied me
From the hag and the hungry goblin
That into rags would rend you
May the spirits that stand by the naked man
In the Book of the Moon defend you
While I do sing, any food
Feeding drink or clothing?
Come dame or maid, be not afraid,
Poor Tom will injure nothing..
No gypsy, slut or doxy
Shall win my mad Tom from me
I'll weep all night, with stars I'll fight
The fray shall well become me
And then I'll be a-murdering
The Man in the Moon to the powder
His staff I'll break, his dog I'll shake
And there'll howl no demon louder
By a knight of ghosts and shadows
I summoned am to tourney
Ten leagues beyond the wide world's end
Methinks it is no journey
The gypsy Snap and Pedro
Are none of Tom's comradoes
The punk I scorn and the cutpurse born,
And the Roaring Boy's bravados
The meek, the white, the gentle,
Me handle not nor spare not;
But those that cross Tom Rhinoceros
Do what the panther dare not
Of thirty years have I
Twice twenty been enragéd
And of forty been three times fifteen
In durance soundly cagéd
When I want provant, with Humphry
I sup, an when benighted
I repose in Paul's with waking souls,
Yet never am affrighted.
The moon's my constant mistress,
And the lonely owl my marrow;
The flaming drake and the night crow make
Me music to my sorrow.
With a host of furious fancies,
Whereof I am commander,
With a burning spear and a horse of air
To the wilderness I wander.
I know more than Apollo,
For oft when he lies sleeping
I see the stars at mortal wars
In the wounded welkin weeping.
The moon embrace her shepherd,
And the queen of love her warrior,
While the first doth horn the star of morn,
And the next the heavenly farrier.
I slept not since the Conquest,
Till then I never waked,
Till the naked boy of love where I lay
Me found and stript me naked.
On the lordly lofts of Bedlam
With stubble soft and dainty,
Brave bracelets strong, sweet whips, ding-dong,
With wholesome hunger plenty.
For to see Mad Tom of Bedlam
Ten thousand miles I travelled
Mad Maudlin goes on dirty toes
For to save her shoes from gravel.