Page:Lyrics of Lowly Life Dunbar (1896).djvu/59



HEN the corn 's all cut and the bright stalks shine

Like the burnished spears of a field of gold;

When the field-mice rich on the nubbins dine,

And the frost comes white and the wind blows cold;

Then it 's heigho! fellows and hi-diddle-diddle,

For the time is ripe for the corn-stalk fiddle.

And you take a stalk that is straight and long,

With an expert eye to its worthy points,

And you think of the bubbling strains of song

That are bound between its pithy joints—

Then you cut out strings, with a bridge in the middle,

With a corn-stalk bow for a corn-stalk fiddle.

Then the strains that grow as you draw the bow

O'er the yielding strings with a practised hand!