The Haymakers' Song by Alfred Austin. Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. 1895. A Victorian Anthology, 1837-1895

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.

The Haymakers’ Song

Alfred Austin (1835–1913)


HERE’S to him that grows it,
Drink, lads, drink!
That lays it in and mows it,
Clink, jugs, clink!
To him that mows and makes it,	5
That scatters it and shakes it,
That turns, and teds, and rakes it,
Clink, jugs, clink!

Now here ’s to him that stacks it,
Drink, lads, drink!	10
That thrashes and that tacks it,
Clink, jugs, clink!
That cuts it out for eating,
When March-dropp’d lambs are bleating,
And the slate-blue clouds are sleeting,	15
Drink, lads, drink!

And here ’s to thane and yeoman,
Drink, lads, drink!
To horseman and to bowman,
Clink, jugs, clink!	20
To lofty and to low man,
Who bears a grudge to no man,
But flinches from no foeman,
Drink, lads, drink!