Next/Previous Post Link – Display date?

I’m looking to create links to my next and previous blog posts. I have the links themselves in, but I want to display that post’s date alongside it.

I’m using this for the link itself:

<?php next_post_link("%link", "Newer"); ?>

I’ve tried this, but it only gives me the date of the current post, rather than next/prev:

<?php next_post_link("%link".the_date("jS F Y")); ?>

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.