Page:Barnes (1879) Poems of rural life in the Dorset dialect (combined).djvu/32

16 She’s gone: an’ she ’ve a-left to me Her mem’ry in the girt woak tree; &emsp;Zoo I do love noo tree so well &emsp;’S the girt woak tree that’s in the dell.

An’ oh! mid never ax nor hook Be brought to spweil his steätely look; Nor ever roun’ his ribby zides Mid cattle rub ther heäiry hides; Nor pigs rout up his turf, but keep His lwonesome sheäde vor harmless sheep; An’ let en grow, an’ let en spread, An’ let en live when I be dead. But oh! if men should come an’ vell The girt woak tree that’s in the dell, An’ build his planks ’ithin the zide O’ zome girt ship to plough the tide, Then, life or death! I’d goo to sea, A saïlèn wi’ the girt woak tree: An’ I upon his planks would stand. An’ die a-fightèn vor the land,— The land so dear,—the land so free,— The land that bore the girt woak tree; &emsp;Vor I do love noo tree so well &emsp;’S the girt woak tree that’s in the dell.

, the girt elem tree out in little hwome groun’ War a-stannèn this mornèn, an’ now’s a-cut down. Aye, the girt elem tree, so big roun’ an’ so high, Where the mowers did goo to their drink, an’ did lie In the sheäde ov his head, when the zun at his heighth Had a-drove em vrom mowèn, wi’ het an’ wi’ drîth,