The Ingoldsby Legends :: :: University of Virginia Library

Thou mayest have read, my little boy Ned,
Though thy mother thine idlesse blames,
In Doctor Goldsmith's history book,
Of a gentleman called King James,
In quilted doublet, and great trunk breeches,
Who held in abhorrence tobacco and witches.

163

Well,—in King James's golden days,—
For the days were golden then,—
They could not be less, for good Queen Bess
Had died aged threescore and ten,
And her days, we know,
Were all of them so;
While the Court poets sung, and the Court gallants swore
That the days were as golden still as before.

Some people, 'tis true, a troublesome few,
Who historical points would unsettle,
Have lately thrown out a sort of a doubt
Of the genuine ring of the metal;
But who can believe to a monarch so wise
People would dare tell a parcel of lies?

—Well, then, in good King James's days,—
Golden or not does not matter a jot,—
Yon ruin a sort of a roof had got;
For though, repairs lacking, its walls had been cracking
Since Harry the Eighth sent its friars a-packing,
Though joists, and floors,
And windows, and doors
Had all disappear'd, yet pillars by scores
Remain'd, and still propp'd up a ceiling or two,
While the belfry was almost as good as new;
You are not to suppose matters look'd just so
In the Ruin some two hundred years ago.

Just in that farthermost angle, where
You see the remains of a winding-stair,
One turret especially high in air

164

Uprear'd its tall gaunt form;
As if defying the power of Fate, or
The hand of “Time the Innovator;”
And though to the pitiless storm
Its weaker brethren all around
Bowing, in ruin had strew'd the ground,
Alone it stood, while its fellows lay strew'd,
Like a four-bottle man in a company “screw'd,”
Not firm on his legs, but by no means subdued.

One night—'twas in Sixteen hundred and six—
I like when I can, Ned, the date to fix,—
The month was May,
Though I can't well say
At this distance of time the particular day—
But oh! that night, that horrible night!
Folks ever afterwards said with affright
That they never had seen such a terrible sight.

The Sun had gone down fiery red;
And if that evening he laid his head
In Thetis's lap beneath the seas,
He must have scalded the goddess's knees.
He left behind him a lurid track
Of blood-red light upon clouds so black,
That Warren and Hunt, with the whole of their crew,
Could scarcely have given them a darker hue.

There came a shrill and a whistling sound,
Above, beneath, beside, and around,
Yet leaf ne'er moved on tree!
So that some people thought old Beelzebub must
Have been lock'd out of doors, and was blowing the dust
From the pipe of his street-door key.

165

And then a hollow moaning blast
Came, sounding more dismally still than the last,
And the lightning flash'd, and the thunder growl'd,
And louder and louder the tempest howl'd,
And the rain came down in such sheets as would stagger a
Bard for a simile short of Niagara.

Rob Gilpin “was a citizen;”
But, though of some “renown,”
Of no great “credit” in his own,
Or any other town.

He was a wild and roving lad,
For ever in the alehouse boozing;
Or romping,—which is quite as bad,—
With female friends of his own choosing.

And Rob this very day had made,
Not dreaming such a storm was brewing,
An assignation with Miss Slade,—
Their trysting-place this same grey Ruin.

But Gertrude Slade became afraid,
And to keep her appointment unwilling,
When she spied the rain on her window-pane
In drops as big as a shilling;
She put off her hat and her mantle again,—
“He'll never expect me in all this rain!”

But little he recks of the fears of the sex,
Or that maiden false to her tryst could be,
He had stood there a good half hour
Ere yet commenced that perilous shower,
Alone by the trysting-tree!

166

Robin looks east, Robin looks west,
But he sees not her whom he loves the best;
Robin looks up, and Robin looks down,
But no one comes from the neighbouring town.

The storm came at last, loud roar'd the blast,
And the shades of evening fell thick and fast;
The tempest grew; and the straggling yew,
His leafy umbrella, was wet through and through;
Rob was half dead with cold and with fright,
When he spies in the ruins a twinkling light—
A hop, two skips, and a jump, and straight
Rob stands within that postern gate.

And there were gossips sitting there,
By one, by two, by three:
Two were an old ill-favour'd pair;
But the third was young, and passing fair,
With laughing eyes and with coal-black hair;
A daintie quean was she!
Rob would have given his ears to sip
But a single salute from her cherry lip.

As they sat in that old and haunted room,
In each one's hand was a huge birch broom,
On each one's head was a steeple-crown'd hat,
On each one's knee was a coal-black cat;
Each had a kirtle of Lincoln green—
It was, I trow, a fearsome scene.

“Now riddle me, riddle me right, Madge Gray,
What foot unhallow'd wends this way?
Goody Price, Goody Price, now areed me aright,
Who roams the old ruins this drearysome night?”

167

Then up and spake that sonsie quean,
And she spake both loud and clear:
“Oh, be it for weal, or be it for woe,
Enter friend, or enter foe,
Rob Gilpin is welcome here!—

“Now tread we a measure! a hall! a hall!
Now tread we a measure,” quoth she—
The heart of Robin
Beat thick and throbbing—
“Roving Rob, tread a measure with me!”—
“Ay, lassie!” quoth Rob, as her hand he gripes,
“Though Satan himself were blowing the pipes!”

Now around they go, and around, and around,
With hop-skip-and-jump, and frolicsome bound,
Such sailing and gilding,
Such sinking and sliding,
Such lofty curvetting,
And grand pirouetting;
Ned, you would swear that Monsieur Gilbert
And Miss Taglioni were capering there!

And oh! such awful music!—ne'er
Fell sounds so uncanny on mortal ear,
There were the tones of a dying man's groans
Mix'd with the rattling of dead men's bones:
Had you heard the shrieks, and the squeals, and the squeaks,
You'd not have forgotten the sound for weeks.

And around, and around, and around they go,
Heel to heel, and toe to toe,
Prance and caper, curvet and wheel,
Toe to toe, and heel to heel.

168

“'Tis merry, 'tis merry, Cummers, I trow,
To dance thus beneath the nightshade bough!”—

“Goody Price, Goody Price, now riddle me right,
Where may we sup this frolicsome night?”—
“Mine Host of the Dragon hath mutton and veal!
The Squire hath partridge, and widgeon, and teal;
But old Sir Thopas hath daintier cheer,
A pasty made of the good red deer,
A huge grouse pie, and a fine Florentine,
A fat roast goose, and a turkey and chine.”—
—“Madge Gray, Madge Gray,
Now tell me, I pray,
Where's the best wassail bowl to our roundelay?”

“—There is ale in the cellars of Tappington Hall,
But the Squire is a churl, and his drink is small;
Mine host of the Dragon
Hath many a flaggon
Of double ale, lamb's-wool, and eau de vie,
But Sir Thopas, the Vicar,
Hath costlier liquor,—
A butt of the choicest Malvoisie.
He doth not lack
Canary or Sack;
And a good pint stoup of Clary wine
Smacks merrily off with a Turkey and Chine!”

“Now away! and away! without delay,
Hey Cockalorum! my Broomstick gay,

169

We must be back ere the dawn of the day:
Hey up the chimney! away! away!”—
Old Goody Price
Mounts in a trice,
In showing her legs she is not over nice;
Old Goody Jones,
All skin and bones,
Follows “like winking.” Away go the crones,
Knees and nose in a line with the toes,
Sitting their brooms like so many Ducrows;
Latest and last
The damsel pass'd,
One glance of her coal-black eye she cast;
She laugh'd with glee loud laughters three,
“Dost fear, Rob Gilpin, to ride with me!”—
Oh, never might man unscath'd espy
One single glance from that coal-black eye.
—Away she flew!—
Without more ado
Rob seizes and mounts on a broomstick too,
“Hey! up the chimney, lass! Hey after you!”

It's a very fine thing on a fine day in June
To ride through the air in a Nassau Balloon;
But you'll find very soon, if you aim at the Moon
In a carriage like that you're a bit of a “Spoon,”
For the largest can't fly
Above twenty miles high,
And you're not half way then on your journey, nor nigh;
While no man alive
Could ever contrive,
Mr. Green has declared, to get higher than five.
And the soundest Philosophers hold that, perhaps,
If you reach'd twenty miles your balloon would collapse,

170

Or pass by such action
The sphere of attraction,
Getting into the track of some comet — Good-lack!
'Tis a thousand to one that you'd never come back;
And the boldest of mortals a danger like that must fear,
And be cautious of getting beyond our own atmosphere.
No, no; when I try
A trip to the sky,
I shan't go in that thing of yours, Mr. Gye,
Though Messieurs Monk Mason, and Spencer, and Beazly,
All join in saying it travels so easily.
No; there's nothing so good
As a pony of wood—
Not like that which, of late, they stuck up on the gate
At the end of the Park, which caused so much debate,
And gave so much trouble to make it stand straight,—
But a regular Broomstick—you'll find that the favourite,—
Above all, when, like Robin, you haven't to pay for it.
—Stay—really I dread
I am losing the thread
Of my tale; and it's time you should be in your bed,
So lithe now, and listen, my little boy Ned!

Stephen Ingoldsby, surnamed “The Niggard,” second cousin and successor to “The Bad Sir Giles.” (Visitation of Kent, 1666.) For an account of his murder by burglars, and their subsequent execution, see Dodsley's “Remarkable Trials,” &c. Lond. 1776, vol. ii. p. 264, and the present volume, Art. “Hand of Glory.”