A Trampwoman's Tragedy

I From Wynyard's Gap the livelong day, The livelong day, We beat afoot the northward way We had travelled times before. The sun-blaze burning on our backs, Our shoulders sticking to our packs, By fosseway, fields, and turnpike tracks We skirted sad Sedge-Moor.

II Full twenty miles we jaunted on, We jaunted on, — My fancy-man, and jeering John, And Mother Lee, and I. And, as the sun drew down to west, We climbed the toilsome Polden crest, And saw, of landskip sights the best, The inn that beamed thereby.

III For months we had padded side by side, Ay, side by side Through the Great Forest, Blackmoor wide, And where the Parret ran. We'd faced the gusts on Mendip ridge, Had crossed the Yeo unhelped by bridge, Been stung by every Marshwood midge, I and my fancy-man.

IV Lone inns we loved, my man and I, My man and I; 'King's Stag', 'Windwhistle' high and dry, 'The Horse' on Hintock Green, The cosy house at Wynyard's Gap, 'The Hut', renowned on Bredy Knap, And many another wayside tap Where folk might sit unseen.

V O deadly day, O deadly day! — I teased my fancy man in play And wanton idleness. I walked alongside jeering John, I laid his hand my waist upon; I would not bend my glances on My lover's dark distress.

VI Thus Poldon top at last we won, At last we won, And gained the inn at sink of sun Far-famed as 'Marshal's Elm'. Beneath us figured tor and lea, From Mendip to the western sea — I doubt if any finer sight there be Within this royal realm.

VII Inside the settle all a-row — All four a-row We sat, I next to John, to show That he had wooed and won. And then he took me on his knee, And swore it was his turn to be My favoured mate, and Mother Lee Passed to my former one.

VIII Then in a voice I had never heard, I had never heard, My only love to me: 'One word, My lady, if you please! Whose is the child you are like to bear? — His? After all my months o' care?' Gods knows 'twas not! But, O despair! I nodded — still to tease.

IX Then he sprung, and with his knife — And with his knife, He let out jeering Johnny's life, Yes; there at set of sun. The slant ray through the window nigh Gilded John's blood and glazing eye, Ere scarcely Mother Lee and I Knew that the deed was done.

X The taverns tell the gloomy tale, The gloomy tale, How that at Ivel-Chester jail My love, my sweetheart swung; Though stained till now by no misdeed Save one horse ta'en in time of need; (Blue Jimmy stole right many a steed Ere his last fling he flung.)

XI Thereaft I walked the world alone Alone, alone! On his death-day I gave my groan And dropt his dead-born child. 'Twas nigh the jail, beneath a tree, None tending me; for Mother Lee Had died at Glaston, leaving me Unfriended on the wild.

XII And in the night as I lay weak, As I lay weak, The leaves a-falling on my cheek, The red moon low declined — The ghost of him I'd die to kiss Rose up and said: 'Ah, tell me this! Was the child mine, or was it his? Speak, that I my rest may find!'

XIII O doubt but I told him then, I told him then, That I had kept me from all men Since we joined lips and swore. Whereat he smiled, and thinned away As the wind stirred to call up day... — 'Tis past! And here alone I stray Haunting the Western Moor.