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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=508049" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>English Eclogues V - The Witch</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">NATHANIEL.<br>Father! here father! I have found a horse-shoe!<br>Faith it was just in time, for t'other night<br>I laid two straws across at Margery's door,<br>And afterwards I fear'd that she might do me<br>A mischief for't. There was the Miller's boy<br>Who set his dog at that black cat of hers,<br>I met him upon crutches, and he told me<br>'Twas all her evil eye.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>'Tis rare good luck;<br>I would have gladly given a crown for one<br>If t'would have done as well. But where did'st find it?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>Down on the Common; I was going a-field<br>And neighbour Saunders pass'd me on his mare;<br>He had hardly said 'good day,' before I saw<br>The shoe drop off; 'twas just upon my tongue<br>To call him back,--it makes no difference, does it.<br>Because I know whose 'twas?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>Why no, it can't.<br>The shoe's the same you know, and you 'did find' it.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>That mare of his has got a plaguey road<br>To travel, father, and if he should lame her,<br>For she is but tender-footed,--</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>Aye, indeed--<br>I should not like to see her limping back<br>Poor beast! but charity begins at home,<br>And Nat, there's our own horse in such a way<br>This morning!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>Why he ha'nt been rid again!<br>Last night I hung a pebble by the manger<br>With a hole thro', and every body says<br>That 'tis a special charm against the hags.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>It could not be a proper natural hole then,<br>Or 'twas not a right pebble,--for I found him<br>Smoking with sweat, quaking in every limb,<br>And panting so! God knows where he had been<br>When we were all asleep, thro' bush and brake<br>Up-hill and down-hill all alike, full stretch<br>At such a deadly rate!--</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>By land and water,<br>Over the sea perhaps!--I have heard tell<br>That 'tis some thousand miles, almost at the end<br>Of the world, where witches go to meet the Devil.<br>They used to ride on broomsticks, and to smear<br>Some ointment over them and then away<br>Out of the window! but 'tis worse than all<br>To worry the poor beasts so. Shame upon it<br>That in a Christian country they should let<br>Such creatures live!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>And when there's such plain proof!<br>I did but threaten her because she robb'd<br>Our hedge, and the next night there came a wind<br>That made me shake to hear it in my bed!<br>How came it that that storm unroofed my barn,<br>And only mine in the parish? look at her<br>And that's enough; she has it in her face--<br>A pair of large dead eyes, rank in her head,<br>Just like a corpse, and purs'd with wrinkles round,<br>A nose and chin that scarce leave room between<br>For her lean fingers to squeeze in the snuff,<br>And when she speaks! I'd sooner hear a raven<br>Croak at my door! she sits there, nose and knees<br>Smoak-dried and shrivell'd over a starved fire,<br>With that black cat beside her, whose great eyes<br>Shine like old Beelzebub's, and to be sure<br>It must be one of his imps!--aye, nail it hard.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>I wish old Margery heard the hammer go!<br>She'd curse the music.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>Here's the Curate coming,<br>He ought to rid the parish of such vermin;<br>In the old times they used to hunt them out<br>And hang them without mercy, but Lord bless us!<br>The world is grown so wicked!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Good day Farmer!<br>Nathaniel what art nailing to the threshold?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>A horse-shoe Sir, 'tis good to keep off witchcraft,<br>And we're afraid of Margery.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Poor old woman!<br>What can you fear from her?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>What can we fear?<br>Who lamed the Miller's boy? who rais'd the wind<br>That blew my old barn's roof down? who d'ye think<br>Rides my poor horse a'nights? who mocks the hounds?<br>But let me catch her at that trick again,<br>And I've a silver bullet ready for her,<br>One that shall lame her, double how she will.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>What makes her sit there moping by herself,<br>With no soul near her but that great black cat?<br>And do but look at her!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Poor wretch! half blind<br>And crooked with her years, without a child<br>Or friend in her old age, 'tis hard indeed<br>To have her very miseries made her crimes!<br>I met her but last week in that hard frost<br>That made my young limbs ache, and when I ask'd<br>What brought her out in the snow, the poor old woman<br>Told me that she was forced to crawl abroad<br>And pick the hedges, just to keep herself<br>From perishing with cold, because no neighbour<br>Had pity on her age; and then she cried,<br>And said the children pelted her with snow-balls,<br>And wish'd that she were dead.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>I wish she was!<br>She has plagued the parish long enough!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Shame farmer!<br>Is that the charity your bible teaches?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>My bible does not teach me to love witches.<br>I know what's charity; who pays his tithes<br>And poor-rates readier?</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Who can better do it?<br>You've been a prudent and industrious man,<br>And God has blest your labour.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>Why, thank God Sir,<br>I've had no reason to complain of fortune.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Complain! why you are wealthy. All the parish<br>Look up to you.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>Perhaps Sir, I could tell<br>Guinea for guinea with the warmest of them.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>You can afford a little to the poor,<br>And then what's better still, you have the heart<br>To give from your abundance.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>God forbid<br>I should want charity!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>Oh! 'tis a comfort<br>To think at last of riches well employ'd!<br>I have been by a death-bed, and know the worth<br>Of a good deed at that most awful hour<br>When riches profit not.<br>Farmer, I'm going<br>To visit Margery. She is sick I hear--<br>Old, poor, and sick! a miserable lot,<br>And death will be a blessing. You might send her<br>Some little matter, something comfortable,<br>That she may go down easier to the grave<br>And bless you when she dies.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>What! is she going!<br>Well God forgive her then! if she has dealt<br>In the black art. I'll tell my dame of it,<br>And she shall send her something.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>CURATE.<br>So I'll say;<br>And take my thanks for her's. ['goes']</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>That's a good man<br>That Curate, Nat, of ours, to go and visit<br>The poor in sickness; but he don't believe<br>In witchcraft, and that is not like a christian.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NATHANIEL.<br>And so old Margery's dying!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FATHER.<br>But you know<br>She may recover; so drive t'other nail in!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Robert+Southey">Robert Southey</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=508049" data-title="English Eclogues V - The Witch de Robert Southey" data-description="NATHANIEL.
Father! here father! I have found a horse-shoe!
Faith it was just in time, for t'other night
I laid two straws across at Margery's door,
And afterwards I fear'd that she might do me
A mischief for't. There was the Miller's boy
Who set h..."></div>
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