A COUNTRY road on market-day | |
| (Is what I see arise), | |
| Crowded with farmers, ruddy men, | |
| Muffled up to the eyes; | |
| For cold and bitter rain beats fast | 5 |
| From the gray cheerless skies. | |
| |
| Past carts with white tilts flagging wet, | |
| Past knots of wrangling hinds, | |
| A burly man with deep-lined face, | |
| Chafed by the churlish winds, | 10 |
| Strides on like dreary packman who | |
| His galling burden binds. | |
| |
| He wears no ruffles round his wrists, | |
| His wig is scorched and worn; | |
| His slouching coat flaps loose and long,— | 15 |
| Its buttons but of horn; | |
| The little lace upon its cuffs | |
| Is frayed and soiled and torn. | |
| |
| It is a day of sullen cloud, | |
| Of shrinking leaf and flower,— | 20 |
| A day the sun to shine or warm | |
| Has neither wish nor power; | |
| So fitful falls the wavering veil | |
| Of the cold bitter shower. | |
| |
| The blackbirds from the hedges break | 25 |
| In chattering dismay, | |
| Like wicked thoughts in sinners’ minds | |
| When they kneel down to pray; | |
| He sees them not, for darkness deep | |
| Bars out for him the day. | 30 |
| |
| Before him black and open graves | |
| Seem yawning in the way; | |
| The sun, a mere vast globe of jet, | |
| Bodes God’s great wrath alway; | |
| He hears strange voices on his track | 35 |
| That fill him with dismay. | |
| |
| The black rooks o’er the fallows whirl | |
| Like demons in the sky, | |
| Watching to do some hurt to man, | |
| But for the sleepless eye | 40 |
| Of God, that, whether day or night, | |
| Still baffles them from high. | |
| |
| The miller’s wagon, dripping flour, | |
| Toils on, close covered in; | |
| The pedler, spite of cloak and pack, | 45 |
| Is drenched unto the skin; | |
| The road to Wroxeter is thronged | |
| With cattle crowding in. | |
| |
| With butting heads against the wind | |
| The farmers canter on | 50 |
| (Sure corn that morning has gone down, | |
| They look so woe-begone); | |
| Till now shone out the steeple vane | |
| The sun has flashed upon. | |
| |
| ’Tween strings of horses dripping wet | 55 |
| The burly man strides fast; | |
| On market stalls and crowded pens | |
| No eager look he cast; | |
| He thought not of the wrangling fair, | |
| But of a day long past. | 60 |
| |
| He comes to where the market cross | |
| Stands towering o’er the stalls, | |
| Where on the awnings, brown and soaked, | |
| The rain unceasing falls; | |
| Where loud the vagrant auctioneer | 65 |
| With noisy clamor bawls. | |
| |
| He heeds not yonder rocking swings | |
| That laughing rustics fill, | |
| But gazes on one stall where sits | |
| A stripling, quiet and still, | 70 |
| Selling his books, although the rain | |
| Falls ceaselessly and chill. | |
| |
| There, in the well-remembered place, | |
| He stands, head low and bare, | |
| Heedless of all the scoffing crowd | 75 |
| Who jostle round and stare, | |
| Crying, “Why, lads, here ’s preacher man | |
| Come to this April Fair.” | |
| |
| “Here ’s th’ April Fool!” a farmer cries, | |
| Holding his swollen side; | 80 |
| Another clacks his whip, a third | |
| Begins to rail and chide, | |
| While salesmen cried their prices out | |
| And with each other vied. | |
| |
| Yet when he silent stood, nor moved | 85 |
| For one long hour at least, | |
| The marketwomen leering said, | |
| “This is some crazy priest | |
| Doing his penance,—pelt him, boys! | |
| Pump on the Popish beast!” | 90 |
| |
| Some counting money turned to sneer; | |
| One with raised hammer there | |
| Kept it still poised, to see the man; | |
| The buyers paused to stare; | |
| The farmer had to hold his dog, | 95 |
| Longing to bite and tear. | |
| |
| As the old clock beats out the time | |
| The stranger strides away, | |
| Past deafening groups of flocks and carts | |
| And many a drunken fray; | 100 |
| The sin of fifty years’ agone | |
| That penance purged away. | |
| |
| Call it not superstition, friends, | |
| Or foolish, weak regret; | |
| He was a great good man whose eyes | 105 |
| With tears that day were wet; | |
| ’T was a brave act to crush his pride,— | |
| Worthy of memory yet. | |
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