The parents being dead and gone
The children home he takes,
And brings them straite unto his house
Where much of them he makes.
He had kept these pretty babes
A twelve month and a daye
But for their wealth he did desire
To make them both away


An assassin is hired to kill them; he leaves them in a deep forest:


These pretty babes with hand in hand
Went wandering up and downe;
But never more could see the man
Approaching from the town:
Their pretty lippes with black-berries
Were all besmeared and dyed
And when they saw the darksome night
They sat them down and cried.
Thus wandered these poor innocents
Till death did end their grief,
In one another's armes they dyed
As wanting due relief;
No burial this pretty pair
Of any man receives
Till robin red-breast piously
Did cover them with leaves.