Album: The Western Years
(Bob Dylan)
Old Reilly stole a stallion
But they caught him and they brought him back
And they laid him down on the jailhouse ground
With an iron chain around his neck
Old Reilly's daughter got a message
That her father was goin' to hang
She rode by night and came by morning
With gold and silver in her hand
When the judge he saw Reilly's daughter
His old eyes deepened in his head,
Sayin', "Gold will never free your father,
The price, my dear, is you instead"
"Oh I'm as good as dead," cried Reilly,
"It's only you that he does crave
And my skin will surely crawl if he touches you at all
Get on your horse and ride away"
"Oh father you will surely die
If I don't take the chance to try
And pay the price and not take your advice
For that reason I will have to stay"
The gallows shadows shook the evening,
In the night a hound dog bayed,
In the night the grounds were groanin',
In the night the price was paid
The next mornin' she had awoken
To know that the judge had never spoken
She saw that hangin' branch a-bendin',
She saw her father's body broken
These be seven curses on a judge so cruel:
That one doctor will not save him,
That two healers will not heal him,
That three eyes will not see him
That four ears will not hear him,
That five walls will not hide him,
That six diggers will not bury him
And that seven deaths shall never kill him