Farewell, rewards and fairies,
Good housewives now may say,

For now foul sluts in dairies
Do fare as well as they;

And though they sweep their hearths no less
Than maids were wont to do,

Yet who of late for cleanliness
Finds sixpence in her shoe?

Lament, lament, old abbeys,
The fairies' lost command,

They did but change priests' babies,
But some have changed your land;

And all your children stol'n from thence
Are now grown puritanes

Who live as changelings ever since
For love of your domains.

At morning and at evening both
You merry were and glad;

So little care of sleep and sloth
These pretty ladies had;

When Tom came home from labor,
Or Ciss to milking rose,

Then merrily went their tabor
And nimbly went their toes.

Witness those rings and roundelays
Of theirs which yet remain

Were footed in Queen Mary's days
On many a grassy plain.

But since of late Elizabeth
And later James came in,

They never dance on any heath
As when the time had been.

By which we note the fairies
Were of the old profession,

Their songs were Ave Maries,
Their dances were procession;

But now alas, they all are dead
Or gone beyond the seas,

Or further from religion fled,
Or else they take their ease.