Sketches in verse :: :: University of Virginia Library

Sketches in verse

with prose illustrations. By Mr. Polwhele. Second edition, with several additional pieces

Polwhele, Richard (1760-1838)

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THE WISHFUL SWAIN, OF DEVON.

While Autumn choak'd with leaves the rill,
Colin, within a shady combe,
Had shap'd his mow, beneath the hill,
And kept the merry harvest-home;
And of its bitter-sweets had strip'd
His orchard for the groaning pound;
When with the first clear juice that drip'd
He hied away, and Sally found.
Sally (says he) dear maiden, sip!”
She frown'd: he tried again to speak—
'Tis sweet as honey to the lip!”
He look'd as if his heart would break.

And then he sought the dark-green lane
Whose willows mourn'd the faded year;
Sighing (I heard the love-lorn swain)
“Wishness —ah! Wishness walketh here!”

The sweet apple, called the bitter-sweet, is more common in the orchards of Devon, than acid fruit, or the rough-sour.

An expression used by the vulgar in the north of Devon, to express local melancholy. There is something sublime in this impersonation of Wishness.