Page:Punch (Volume 147).pdf/114

110

New Maid,

Débutante.



miles I'd tramped by down and hill;
 * With eve I found the happy ending:

All in the sunset, golden chill,
 * The collie met me, grave, befriending.

I saw the roof-tree down the vale,
 * Brave fields of harvest spread thereunder;

The collie waved a feathery tail
 * And led me to the House of Wonder.

Houses, like people, so I've thought,
 * Bear character upon their faces,

Born of their company and wrought
 * Upon by inward gifts and graces:

Here, through the harvest's gold array
 * And evening's mellow far niente,

Looked kindliness and work-a-day,
 * And happy hours and peace and plenty.

And, lo, it seemed the Downs amid
 * I'd found a folded bit of Britain,

Laid by in lavender and hid
 * The year—let's say—Tom Jones was written;

An old farm manor-house it is
 * With fantails fluttering on the gables,

A place of men and memories
 * And solid facts and homespun fables.

For Fact: a fortnight passed me by
 * And strawberries of late July

Mid ancient oak and secret panel
 * And distant glimpses of the Channel;

Fair morns to wake on—were they not?—
 * Each day a page of ,

Full of the pigeons' coo and cadence,
 * All cream and flowers and pretty maidens.

For Fable: as I smoked a pipe
 * And havered with a black-haired cowman,

Grey-eyed, in that fine Celtic type,
 * As much the poet as the ploughman—

"Seems kind of lucky here," said I;
 * "The very ducklings look more downy

Than others do." He grinned: "An' why?
 * May happen, Sir, we feeds a brownie!

There isn't many left,' says you;
 * As hearts grow hard the breed gets rarer;

Yet, when he goes, the luck goes too,
 * And prices fall and boards be barer;

But if so be you does your part
 * An' feeds him fair and treats folk proper,

Keepin' for all the kindly heart—
 * The lucky Lad's a certain stopper!"

Well, should you go by Butser way
 * And hit the god-sent path, and follow,

You'll find, at closing of the day,
 * The old house in the valley-hollow,

Laid by in lavender, forgot,
 * The home of peace and ancient plenty:

A brownie may be there or not— The hearts are kind enough for twenty!



"'Of the five catalpa trees in the Embankment-gardens the finest has been blighted. The tree is close to the National Liberal Club.' Leicester Daily Mercury."