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[Time, 1571] THE OLD mayor climbed the belfry tower, | |
The ringers ran by two, by three; | |
Pull! if ye never pulled before; | |
Good ringers, pull your best, quoth he. | |
Play uppe, play uppe, O Boston bells! | 5 |
Ply all your changes, all your swells! | |
Play uppe The Brides of Enderby! | |
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Men say it was a stolen tyde, | |
The Lord that sent it, he knows all, | |
But in myne ears doth still abide | 10 |
The message that the bells let fall; | |
And there was naught of strange, beside | |
The flights of mews and peewits pied, | |
By millions crouched on the old sea-wall. | |
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I sat and spun within the doore; | 15 |
My thread brake off, I raised myne eyes: | |
The level sun, like ruddy ore, | |
Lay sinking in the barren skies; | |
And dark against days golden death | |
She moved where Lindis wandereth, | 20 |
My sonnes faire wife, Elizabeth. | |
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Cusha! Cusha! Cusha! calling, | |
Ere the early dews were falling, | |
Farre away I heard her song. | |
Cusha! Cusha! all along; | 25 |
Where the reedy Lindis floweth, | |
Floweth, floweth, | |
From the meads where melick groweth, | |
Faintly came her milking-song. | |
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Cusha! Cusha! Cusha! calling, | 30 |
For the dews will soone be falling; | |
Leave your meadow grasses mellow, | |
Mellow, mellow! | |
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow! | |
Come uppe, Whitefoot! come uppe, Lightfoot! | 35 |
Quit the stalks of parsley hollow, | |
Hollow, hollow! | |
Come uppe, Jetty! rise and follow; | |
From the clovers lift your head! | |
Come uppe, Whitefoot! come uppe, Lightfoot! | 40 |
Come uppe, Jetty! rise and follow, | |
Jetty, to the milking-shed. | |
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If it be longay, long ago | |
When I beginne to think howe long, | |
Againe I hear the Lindis flow, | 45 |
Swift as an arrowe, sharpe and strong; | |
And all the aire, it seemeth mee, | |
Bin full of floating bells (sayth shee), | |
That ring the tune of Enderby. | |
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Alle fresh the level pasture lay, | 50 |
And not a shadowe mote be seene, | |
Save where, full fyve good miles away, | |
The steeple towered from out the greene. | |
And lo! the great bell farre and wide | |
Was heard in all the country side | 55 |
That Saturday at eventide. | |
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The swannerds, where their sedges are, | |
Moved on in sunsets golden breath; | |
The shepherde lads I heard afarre, | |
And my sonnes wife, Elizabeth; | 60 |
Till, floating oer the grassy sea, | |
Came downe that kyndly message free, | |
The Brides of Mavis Enderby. | |
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Then some looked uppe into the sky, | |
And all along where Lindis flows | 65 |
To where the goodly vessels lie, | |
And where the lordly steeple shows. | |
They sayde, And why should this thing be, | |
What danger lowers by land or sea? | |
They ring the tune of Enderby. | 70 |
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For evil news from Mablethorpe, | |
Of pyrate galleys, warping down, | |
For shippes ashore beyond the scorpe, | |
They have not spared to wake the towne; | |
But while the west bin red to see, | 75 |
And storms be none, and pyrates flee, | |
Why ring The Brides of Enderby? | |
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I looked without, and lo! my sonne | |
Came riding downe with might and main; | |
He raised a shout as he drew on, | 80 |
Till all the welkin rang again: | |
Elizabeth! Elizabeth! | |
(A sweeter woman neer drew breath | |
Than my sonnes wife, Elizabeth.) | |
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The olde sea-wall (he cryed) is downe! | 85 |
The rising tide comes on apace; | |
And boats adrift in yonder towne | |
Go sailing uppe the market-place! | |
He shook as one that looks on death: | |
God save you, mother! straight he sayth; | 90 |
Where is my wife, Elizabeth? | |
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Good sonne, where Lindis winds away | |
With her two bairns I marked her long; | |
And ere yon bells beganne to play, | |
Afar I heard her milking-song. | 95 |
He looked across the grassy sea, | |
To right, to left, Ho, Enderby! | |
They rang The Brides of Enderby. | |
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With that he cried and beat his breast; | |
For lo! along the rivers bed | 100 |
A mighty eygre reared his crest, | |
And uppe the Lindis raging sped. | |
It swept with thunderous noises loud, | |
Shaped like a curling snow-white cloud, | |
Or like a demon in a shroud. | 105 |
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And rearing Lindis, backward pressed, | |
Shook all her trembling bankes amaine; | |
Then madly at the eygres breast | |
Flung uppe her weltering walls again. | |
Then bankes came downe with ruin and rout, | 110 |
Then beaten foam flew round about, | |
Then all the mighty floods were out. | |
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So farre, so fast, the eygre drave, | |
The heart had hardly time to beat | |
Before a shallow seething wave | 115 |
Sobbed in the grasses at oure feet: | |
The feet had hardly time to flee | |
Before it brake against the knee, | |
And all the world was in the sea. | |
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Upon the roofe we sate that night; | 120 |
The noise of bells went sweeping by; | |
I marked the lofty beacon light | |
Stream from the church-tower, red and high, | |
A lurid mark, and dread to see; | |
And awsome bells they were to mee, | 125 |
That in the dark rang Enderby. | |
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They rang the sailor lads to guide, | |
From roofe to roofe who fearless rowed; | |
And I,my sonne was at my side, | |
And yet the ruddy beacon glowed; | 130 |
And yet he moaned beneath his breath, | |
O, come in life, or come in death! | |
O lost! my love, Elizabeth! | |
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And didst thou visit him no more? | |
Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter deare? | 135 |
The waters laid thee at his doore | |
Ere yet the early dawn was clear: | |
Thy pretty bairns in fast embrace, | |
The lifted sun shone on thy face, | |
Downe drifted to thy dwelling-place. | 140 |
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That flow strewed wrecks about the grass, | |
That ebbe swept out the flocks to sea, | |
A fatal ebbe and flow, alas! | |
To manye more than myne and mee; | |
But each will mourne his own (she sayth) | 145 |
And sweeter woman neer drew breath | |
Than my sonnes wife, Elizabeth. | |
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I shall never hear her more | |
By the reedy Lindis shore, | |
Cusha! Cusha! Cusha! calling, | 150 |
Ere the early dews be falling; | |
I shall never hear her song, | |
Cusha! Cusha! all along, | |
Where the sunny Lindis floweth, | |
Goeth, floweth, | 155 |
From the meads where melick groweth, | |
Where the water, winding down, | |
Onward floweth to the town. | |
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I shall never see her more, | |
Where the reeds and rushes quiver, | 160 |
Shiver, quiver, | |
Stand beside the sobbing river, | |
Sobbing, throbbing, in its falling, | |
To the sandy, lonesome shore; | |
I shall never hear her calling, | 165 |
Leave your meadow grasses mellow, | |
Mellow, mellow! | |
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow! | |
Come uppe, Whitefoot! come uppe, Lightfoot! | |
Quit your pipes of parsley hollow, | 170 |
Hollow, hollow! | |
Come uppe, Lightfoot! rise and follow; | |
Lightfoot! Whitefoot! | |
From your clovers lift the head; | |
Come uppe, Jetty! follow, follow, | 175 |
Jetty, to the milking-shed! | |
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