The Suffolk Miracle

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The Suffolk Miracle is Child ballad 272.

[edit] Synopsis

A young maiden of noble birth comes to love a young commoner, so the maids father sends her away. While on her exile, the maid wakes one night to find her lover at her window mounted upon a fine horse. They go out riding together until the man complains he has a headache - the maid tends to him and ties her handkerchief around his head. She returns to her father, who gives her the news that her young lover has in fact died of grief, whereupon he goes to his grave and digs up the bones, finding that her handkerchief is tied round the skull.