And when the meal is sacked and safely bound
John goeth out, and found his horse was gone,
And cried aloud with many a stamp and groan,
"Our horse is lost! Allen, 'od's banes! I say,
Up on thy feet!--come off, man--up, away!
Alas! our Warden's palfrey, it is gone!"

Allen at once forgot both meal and corn -
Out of his mind went all his husbandry -
"What! whilk way is he gone?" he 'gan to cry.

The Miller's wife came laughing inwardly,
"Alas!" said she, "your horse i' the fens doth fly
After wild mares as fast as he can go!
Ill-luck betide the man that bound him so,
And his that better should have knit the rein."

"Alas!" quoth John, "good Allen, haste amain;
Lay down thy sword, as I will mine also;
Heaven knoweth I am as nimble as a roe;
He shall not 'scape us baith, or my saul's dead!
Why didst not put the horse within the shed?
By the mass, Allen, thou'rt a fool, I say!"

Those silly clerks have scampered fast away
Unto the fen; Allen and nimble John:
And when the Miller saw that they were gone,
He half a bushel of their flour doth take,
And bade his wife go knead it in a cake.
He said, "I trow these clerks feared what they've found;