En.Citatepedia^®.ro

Our Heritage

This is our heritage; the far-flung grass,
The golden stubble and the dark-red moor;
Men pass and perish as the swift years pass,
But wide and wind-swept still the fields endure.
This is our heritage; the love of sport,
A fair ambition and a friendly strife,
The rivalry of farm and camp and court,
The keen endeavour of a clean, hard life.
The hoofs of horses on the trampled lea,
The crash and rattle of the broken rail
Where the first flight ride reckless, knee to knee,
And bold men face the dangers of the vale.
The cry of hounds, the holloa and the horn ;
The lean red shadows where the foxes run;
To these and all their challenge we were born,
And these we leave behind us, sire to son.
This is the heritage that none can take,
The gift we hold, the gift we give again,
And this the spirit that no Time can break,
So long as England and her fields remain.

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Hounds going home in the Dark

Rustle of feet in the roadside grass,
Trample of horses' hoofs, and - Hark!
Blast of an anxious horn! Hounds pass;
Hounds going home in the dark.
Bold was our huntsman galloping free
On a difficult line to the hills to-day,
But his hand is trembling against his knee
At the hint of a light on the King's Highway.

‘ Car!' And the gold spreads over the sky ;
‘ Keep to the front there! Stop them, Mark!
' Toot-toot-too-oot ! - ' Halloo, there !-Hi ! ‘-
Hounds going home in the dark.
Crack of a whip as the headlights near-
Blind in the blaze they group and grope.
‘ Curse the feller, and can't he hear?
Put 'em across, there I-Cope, boys, cope! '

When never a star is hung in the sky,
With never a lamp or a lantern spark,
Huntsman and Whips go groping by,
Blowing them home in the dark.

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Heritage Hills Class Of Eighty-One

Heritage Hills Class of Eighty One
Here it is, the year two thousand eleven
Thirty years, thirty years, where did it go
Saddened to learn a few are gone on to Heaven

Heritage Hills Class of Eighty One
My, oh my, where did the time fly
Wow…victories, tears, joy, and fun
Being a grandparent is love not to deny

Heritage Hills Class of Eighty One
Some led the life of the moth to the flame
Many went on to higher knowledge
Knowing happiness in a life that's tame

Heritage Hills Class of Eighty One
One time Providence dealt us a course unknown
We handled it, conquered it, survived it
Now, we bask in seeing our children grown

Heritage Hills Class of Eighty One
Yes, we are middle aged and gray
A few aches, a few pains, but no complaints
It's class reunion time…oh what a great day

poem by Charles Hancock
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English Grass

Come, horsemen all, from every field
And taste this rare delight,
And see what English pastures yield
To those whose hearts beat right!
Come, haste and quaff the stirrup-cup!
Turn down the empty glass!
The horn is blown, the hunt is up,
And here's our English grass!
And here are foxes swift to find
And fences strong to break,
And here are doubles steep and blind
That try the best to take,
And dappled hounds to keep in sight
And rivals you must pass
Before the long December night
Enshrouds the English grass!
And think it not a lightsome thing
Or feat to wake your scorn
To follow where the Pytchley swing
Or lead them with the Quorn ;
For men have hacked the mulga trail
And packed the mountain pass,
Yet found the boldest heart may fail
To ride the English grass.
The meadows stretch from stream to stream,
Close-bitten, firm, and sound;
No stubble stands, no plough man's team
Rips up the ravaged ground;
But level far as eye can see
Like smooth green-tinted glass,
A battle-ground for bravery,
Is spread the English grass.
Though thorns be thick, though binders lace,
Though stout be stile and rail,
Though nought but blood can live the pace,
And nought but pluck prevail,
The call's to all, the field is fair
To every creed and class;
So draw your girths, all ye who dare,
And ride the English grass!

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Once we went Gaily

Once we went gaily with never a care,
And the bigger the fences, the bolder we were;
Once the wild wind was our spur and our lash,
Once we would laugh at the splinter and crash
As the rails broke behind us, and thrill to the call
Of twelve foot of water or five foot of wall.
Once we could cope with the bucker's demands,
Once the hard puller came back to our hands;
Once the green four-year-old, fretting and free,
Flinging the foam in white flecks to his knee,
Bent to our bidding and held us our place,
O'er the stiffest of country whatever the pace.
To blood running hotly, to hearts beating strong,
Not the longest of days was a moment too long;
‘Till the evening drew over its mantle of stars
We would ride to the hoof-beat and rattle of bars.
There was song in the gale, there was kiss in the rain;
Ah! Once we went gaily-but never again!
For the harsh years have stolen that magical zest
When with confident courage we rode with the best.
Now swift and unchallenged the braver may pass
On their reefing blood horses, hard held, on the grass;
The nerve is departed, the rapture denied,
And the chase must be left to the young ones to ride.

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Fern Hill

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and
cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was
air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the
nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking
warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would
take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

poem by Dylan Thomas
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A Gift Of Love

When you were born
There in your mother's arms
An angel told me always you will be
A gift of love from God to me
Though your road is long
I'll be right by your side
Through changes you'll see always you will be
A gift of love from God to me
Love took flight the day you came into my life
There is magic in the way I feel
Hearts opened wide gazing into your eyes
I'll be there for you
As long as I am alive
I have never loved
More than I love you
A gift for free always you will be
A gift of love from God to me

song performed by by Randy Travis
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The True Sportsman

The real ones, the right ones, the straight ones and the true,
The pukka, peerless sportsmen-their numbers are but few;
The men who keep on playing though the sun be in eclipse,
The men who go on losing with a laugh upon their lips.
The men who care but little for the laurels of renown;
The men who turn their horses back to help the man that's down;
The fearless and the friendly ones, the courtly and the kind;
The men whose lion courage is with gentleness combined.
My notion of a sportsman ? - I'll try, then, to define.
For preference well bred, of course, of some clean- living line;
With pride of place and ancestry whose service was the King's;
With all a noble knight's contempt for low, left- handed things.
Not the ‘good sport' who burdens us with cheap and futile chat
Of the 'pedigree' of this one and the ‘outside chance' of that,
But a man who loves good horses just to handle them and ride
Where the fences call to valour and the English grass lies wide.
All the best and truest sportsmen I have lived with and have known
Have a changeless faith within them which their simple hearts enthrone,
Believing in the God that made the green fields passing fair,
The God that gave good courage - and to every man his share.
And all the truest sportsmen I have met have had this gift:
A love of all the classic books that lighten and uplift;
And all have loved red woodlands, swift birds and coloured flowers;
And all have played with children and counted not the hours.
And I think when God has gathered all the men that He has made,
The perfect British sportsman may stand forward unafraid;
For, brave and kind and courtly, and clean of heart and hand,
No life than his seems nearer to the life our Maker planned.

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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At Night

Crazed shadows, from no golden body
That I can see, embrace me warm ;
All is purple and closed
Round by night's arm.

A brilliance wings from dark-lit voices,
Wild lost voices of shadows white
See the long houses lean
To the weird flight.

Star amorous things that wake at sleep-time
(Because the sun spreads wide like a tree
With no good fruit for them)
Thrill secrecy.

Pale horses ride before the morning,
The secret roots of the sun to tread,
With hoofs shod with venom
And ageless dread;

To breathe on burning emerald grasses
And opalescent dews of the day,
And poison at the core
What smiles may stray.

poem by Isaac Rosenberg
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Absolution

The anguish of the earth absolves our eyes
Till beauty shines in all that we can see.
War is our scourge; yet war has made us wise,
And, fighting for our freedom, we are free.

Horror of wounds and anger at the foe,
And loss of things desired; all these must pass.
We are the happy legion, for we know
Time’s but a golden wind that shakes the grass.

There was an hour when we were loth to part
From life we longed to share no less than others.
Now, having claimed this heritage of heart,
What need we more, my comrades and my brothers?

poem by Siegfried Sassoon
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The First Flight

While there's one on his feet with a tale to repeat
And another is sampling a drink,
The eager First Flight have a girth to draw tight
Or a chain to let out by a link;
While the boisterous laugh in that circle of chaff
The opening music has drowned,
You will hear the First Flight as they whisper 'That's right!'
To the note of a favourite hound.
When a holloa makes sure that his start is secure
And dispels every doubt of a run,
When the crowd gallops straight to the obvious gate
With the latch that is never undone,
You will see the First Flight cram a topper on tight,
Catch a willing old nag by the head
And clapping on sail at the blackthorn or rail,
Take the line of the robber in red.
They thunder away over stubble and clay,
Over roots or the level o' lea,
The gallant First Flight that are soon out of sight
While the slow ones are sadly at sea.
The crash of a rail in the cream of the vale
Is to them but a matter of mirth,
And the avalanche fall of a hoof-rattled wall
But the merriest music on earth.
There are gaps, there are gates for the coward who waits,
There are roads for the fellow who fears;
To left nor to right go the gallant First Flight
Save to veer with the chase as it veers.
No field has a fence so dark-looming and dense
Or a rail so unyielding and stout
But if once the First Flight have got in it all right
You may trust them to find a way out.
Now the men who ride first may be frequently cursed
As they press on the faltering pack,
But we're all of us loth to pull up for an oath
When it comes from a field or two back;
And the Master may blame and the jealous declaim
But the weakest must go to the wall,
And it's plain the First Flight have the premier right
If the hounds may be hustled at all.
Come drink with me, then, to the big-hearted men
Who have pluck to sit down and go straight!
Whether farmer or squire may they keep out of wire
And be spared a lift home on a gate!
Fill your glasses tonight to the gallant First Flight,
Let us wish them the luck of the line
And tomorrow's recall to the best game of all,
And the wind that is better than wine!

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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The Old Squire

I LIKE the hunting of the hare
Better than that of the fox;
I like the joyous morning air,
And the crowing of the cocks.

I like the calm of the early fields,
The ducks asleep by the lake,
The quiet hour which Nature yields
Before mankind is awake.

I like the pheasants and feeding things
Of the unsuspicious morn;
I like the flap of the wood-pigeon’s wings
As she rises from the corn.

I like the blackbird’s shriek, and his rush
From the turnips as I pass by,
And the partridge hiding her head in a bush,
For her young ones cannot fly.

I like these things, and I like to ride,
When all the world is in bed,
To the top of the hill where the sky grows wide,
And where the sun grows red.

The beagles at my horse heels trot
In silence after me;
There ’s Ruby, Roger, Diamond, Dot,
Old Slut and Margery,—

A score of names well used, and dear,
The names my childhood knew;
The horn, with which I rouse their cheer,
Is the horn my father blew.

I like the hunting of the hare
Better than that of the fox;
The new world still is all less fair
Than the old world it mocks.

I covet not a wider range
Than these dear manors give;
I take my pleasures without change,
And as I lived I live.

I leave my neighbors to their thought;
My choice it is, and pride,
On my own lands to find my sport,
In my own fields to ride.

The hare herself no better loves
The field where she was bred,
Than I the habit of these groves,
My own inherited.

I know my quarries every one,
The meuse where she sits low;
The road she chose to-day was run
A hundred years ago.

The lags, the gills, the forest ways,
The hedgerows one and all,
These are the kingdoms of my chase,
And bounded by my wall;

Nor has the world a better thing,
Though one should search it round,
Than thus to live one’s own sole king,
Upon one’s own sole ground.

I like the hunting of the hare;
It brings me, day by day,
The memory of old days as fair,
With dead men passed away.

To these, as homeward still I ply
And pass the churchyard gate,
Where all are laid as I must lie,
I stop and raise my hat.

I like the hunting of the hare;
New sports I hold in scorn.
I like to be as my fathers were,
In the days e’er I was born.

poem by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
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The Opening Run

The rain-sodden grass in the ditches is dying,
The berries are red to the crest of the thorn ;
Coronet-deep where the beech leaves are lying
The hunters stand tense to the twang of the horn ;
Where rides are re-filled with the green of the mosses,
All foam-flecked and fretful their long line is strung,
You can see the white gleam as a starred forehead tosses,
You can hear the low chink as a bit-bar is flung.
The world's full of music. Hounds rustle the rover
Through brushwood and fern to a glad 'Gone away!'
With a 'Come along, Pilot! '-one spur-touch and over-
The huntsman is clear on his galloping grey;
Before him the pack's running straight on the stubble-
Toot-toot-too-too-too-oot ! ,_, Tow-row-ow-ow-ow ! '
The leaders are clambering up through the double
And glittering away on the brown of the plough.
The front rank, hands down, have the big fence's measure;
The faint hearts are craning to left and to right;
The Master goes through with a crash on The Treasure,
The grey takes the lot like a gull in his flight.
There's a brown crumpled up, lying still as a dead one.
There 's a roan mare refusing, as stubborn as sin,
While the breaker flogs up on a green underbred one
And smashes the far-away rail with a grin.
The chase carries on over hilltop and hollow,
The life of Old England, the pluck and the fun;
And who would ask more than a stiff line to follow
With hounds running hard in the Opening Run?

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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I've led this empty life for over forty years and now I can pass that heritage on and ensure that the misery will continue for at least one more generation.

quote by Larry David
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Gallop from the Train

Though I can't afford a hunter -more's the pity,
I love a rousing gallop like the rest!-
Every morning as I travel to the city
I have five and forty minutes of the best.

As we leave our country station there's a holloa
(If it's but the engine whistle, never mind!).
By the window I am sitting, and I follow
Where the horn of fancy tells me of a find.

Through the rattle of our going comes the chorus,
'Tis a south wind and a proper scenting day,
There's a topping piece of country spread before us,
And I'll jump it all in fancy on the grey.

How he dances as I edge him through the others;
He is fond of this finessing for a start,
Just a little bit more eager than his brothers
By a beat, or maybe two beats of his heart

There's a gap we know of leading from the stubble,
And we have it while the other people pass.
A crash behind us! Some one tasting trouble!
We are over, in the lead, and on the grass.

How he lays him down to revel in his freedom!
How he snatches at his snaffle as he goes!
The field will have to gallop when we lead 'em!
Hark, behind us! There's another on his nose!

Here's an oak rail with a trappy ditch behind it,
And I feel the little beggar-shortening stride.
It's a big one, but I know he wouldn't mind it
Were it twice as big and half again as wide!

So I catch him by the head a little shorter,
And his answer comes a-thrilling from the bit;
Then I loose him, and he flies it. What a snorter!
And he never made the shadow of a hit!

So we take those rasping fences -well, perhaps a wee bit faster
Than we'd take 'em if we were not on a train!
And there's not a soul before us but the huntsman and the Master
And a toiling field is squandered once again.

By a grey suburban station, to the sullen air-brake's grinding,
We kill our dog fox handsomely at last.
It was five and forty minutes to the finish from the finding-
And at fifty miles an hour 'twas pretty fast!

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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Life's A Gift

Life’s a gift for you to send
Life’s a gift for god to end
Life’s a gift now you’re with me
Life’s a gift for all to see
Life’s a gift when love is true
Life’s a gift when times look blue
Life’s a gift with the one you trust
Life’s a gift even if UN just
Life’s a gift a ray of sun
Life’s a gift though your heads held to a gun
Life’s a gift when its handed on a tray
Life’s a gift even though it’s always on display
Life’s a gift it’s hard to understand how
Life’s a gift so take advantage of it now

poem by SharonAnn Dawson
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And it's a crime because the great plays of history, going all the way back to the Greeks, are part of everybody's heritage. It's just like in music, Beethoven or Mozart, that's everybody's heritage.

quote by Tony Randall
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Trust in the Lord

The air is dark and heavy
All your life's burdens are here
The road seems long and rocky
And your heart is filled with fear
The horizon fills with darkness
As the storm comes strong ahead
You feel so weak and hopeless
But, you remember what's been said
Trust in the Lord
When you cry, when you sing
Don't beleive your own eyes
For He sees everything
And in all ways give thanks
Thanks for His grace and love
He will lead you through this life
By the spirit, sent from above
You've seen the battles fought
You've seen your friends pass by
Sometimes life seems so pointless
That it's hard to even try
But, God has given you a gift
A gift of salvation and grace
He loves you in your weakness
Just look into His face
Trust in the Lord
When you cry, when you sing
Don't beleive your own eyes
For He sees everything
And in all ways give thanks
Thanks for His grace and love
He will lead you through this life
By the spirit, sent from above

((November 19th,2000))

poem by Danny Speicher
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The Game of our Hearts

This is the game of our hearts!
Foot to the stirrup! Away!
Care with the night departs,
Joy comes in with the day.
A good horse tossing his rings,
A light rime decking the thorn:
And the heart of the horseman sings
For love of a hunting morn.
This is the game of our hearts!
Mottled flanks in the fern;
Rate where a rabbit starts,
Cheer to a waving stern;
Call that we rush to obey
From a Whip at his post outside:
Gone away! Gone aw-a-a-ay!
And we sit down to ride.
This is the game of our hearts!
Crash and rattle of rail;
Lean hounds driving like darts
Into the breast of the vale.
Tried Age taking the lead,
Rash Youth coated with clay;
Glory and glamour of speed,
And a right fox away.
This is the game of our hearts,
Whatever luck may ensue-
This, where a Master of Arts
May fail and a dunce get through!
This, where the confident thrust;
This, where the cowardly crane;
This, where there's nothing to trust
But fate and the feel of the rein.
This is the game of our hearts!
Squire and lawyer and lord,
Men of the farms and the marts,
Men of the pen and the sword;
Comrades we jog to the meet,
Rivals we ride the line,
And the sound of the hoofs is sweet
And the taste of the wind is wine.

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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As precious as life itself is our heritage of individual freedom, for man's free agency is a God-given gift.

quote by David O. McKay
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Music of the Chase

I don't know any tune from any other,
I couldn't sing a song if I were paid,
I couldn't for the ransom of a brother,
Hum a single thing that anybody played.
But I know one melody
That can stir the heart of me-
It's the mad and merry challenge of the horn !
With the chime of hounds that follow,
And the cheer and rate and holloa
That can shake the very dewdrops from the thorn!
I couldn't make a fortune with a fiddle,
I scarce can sing a psalm-tune in a pew,
I couldn't lead a partner 'down the middle'
With a more than sporting chance of getting through.
I couldn't for my life
Play a cornet or a fife
And the flute was never any friend of mine;
But I do appreciate
When a yokel on a gate
Gives a holloa that can hold us to the line!
For everything is music when you hunt,
From the guttural ' Gar'r' on there!' of the Whip
To the' Tally-ho !' of some one up in front
Or the holloa of a herdsman in the dip;
The crash of post and rail
In a sort of running scale,
The thunder as the gallopers go by,
The ringing' For'ard on ! '
That is swallowed up anon
In the chorus of the pack against the sky !
So let others swear by Melba if they will,
By Crossley, Tetrazzini, and the rest;
I 'll be happy if I hear upon the hill
The voices of the ladies I love best-
The voices of a pack
Running hot upon his track,
And the cheer of one that saw the way he went!
When they hustle him along
Is there any grander song
Than the song of sixteen couple on a scent?

poem by William Henry Ogilvie
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