C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
A Christmas Carol
By George Wither (1588–1667)
S
Let every man be jolly;
Each room with ivy leaves is drest,
And every post with holly.
Though some churls at our mirth repine,
Round your foreheads garlands twine;
Drown sorrow in a cup of wine,
And let us all be merry.
And no man minds his labor;
Our lasses have provided them
A bagpipe and a tabor.
Young men and maids and girls and boys
Give life to one another’s joys,
And you anon shall by their noise
Perceive that they are merry.
Their hall of music soundeth;
And dogs thence with whole shoulders run,
So all things here aboundeth.
The country folk themselves advance,
For Crowdy-mutton’s come out of France;
And Jack shall pipe, and Jill shall dance,
And all the town be merry.
And all his best apparel;
Brisk Nell hath bought a ruff of lawn
With droppings of the barrel.
And those that hardly all the year
Had bread to eat or rags to wear,
Will have both clothes and dainty fare,
And all the day be merry.
About the street are singing;
The boys are come to catch the owls
The wild mare in is bringing.
Our kitchen-boy hath broke his box;
And to the dealing of the ox
Our honest neighbors come by flocks,
And here they will be merry.
Should we, I pray, be duller?
No: let us sing our roundelays
To make our mirth the fuller;
And whilest thus inspired we sing,
Let all the streets with echoes ring:
Woods, and hills, and everything
Bear witness we are merry.