At Casterbridge Fair

I

THE BALLAD-SINGER

Sing, Ballad-singer, raise a hearty tune;
Make me forget that there was ever a one
I walked with in the meek light of the moon
&nbsp When the day's work was done.

Rhyme, Ballad-rhymer, start a country song;
Make me forget that she whom I loved well
Swore she would love me dearly, love me long,
&nbsp Then—what I cannot tell!

Sing, Ballad-singer, from your little book;
Make me forget those heart-breaks, achings, fears;
Make me forget her name, her sweet sweet look -
&nbsp Make me forget her tears.

II

FORMER BEAUTIES

These market-dames, mid-aged, with lips thin-drawn,
&nbsp And tissues sere,
Are they the ones we loved in years agone,
&nbsp And courted here?

Are these the muslined pink young things to whom
&nbsp We vowed and swore
In nooks on summer Sundays by the Froom,
&nbsp Or Budmouth shore?

Do they remember those gay tunes we trod
&nbsp Clasped on the green;
Aye; trod till moonlight set on the beaten sod
&nbsp A satin sheen?

They must forget, forget! They cannot know
&nbsp What once they were,
Or memory would transfigure them, and show
&nbsp Them always fair.

III

AFTER THE CLUB-DANCE

Black'on frowns east on Maidon,
&nbsp And westward to the sea,
But on neither is his frown laden
&nbsp With scorn, as his frown on me!

At dawn my heart grew heavy,
&nbsp I could not sip the wine,
I left the jocund bevy
&nbsp And that young man o' mine.

The roadside elms pass by me, -
&nbsp Why do I sink with shame
When the birds a-perch there eye me?
&nbsp They, too, have done the same!

IV

THE MARKET-GIRL

Nobody took any notice of her as she stood on the causey kerb,
All eager to sell her honey and apples and bunches of garden herb;
And if she had offered to give her wares and herself with them too that day,
I doubt if a soul would have cared to take a bargain so choice away.

But chancing to trace her sunburnt grace that morning as I passed nigh,
I went and I said "Poor maidy dear!—and will none of the people buy?"
And so it began; and soon we knew what the end of it all must be,
And I found that though no others had bid, a prize had been won by me.

V

THE INQUIRY

And are ye one of Hermitage -
Of Hermitage, by Ivel Road,
And do ye know, in Hermitage
A thatch-roofed house where sengreens grow?
And does John Waywood live there still -
He of the name that there abode
When father hurdled on the hill
&nbsp Some fifteen years ago?

Does he now speak o' Patty Beech,
The Patty Beech he used to—see,
Or ask at all if Patty Beech
Is known or heard of out this way?
- Ask ever if she's living yet,
And where her present home may be,
And how she bears life's fag and fret
&nbsp After so long a day?

In years agone at Hermitage
This faded face was counted fair,
None fairer; and at Hermitage
We swore to wed when he should thrive.
But never a chance had he or I,
And waiting made his wish outwear,
And Time, that dooms man's love to die,
&nbsp Preserves a maid's alive.

VI

A WIFE WAITS

Will's at the dance in the Club-room below,
&nbsp Where the tall liquor-cups foam;
I on the pavement up here by the Bow,
&nbsp Wait, wait, to steady him home.

Will and his partner are treading a tune,
&nbspLoving companions they be;
Willy, before we were married in June,
&nbsp Said he loved no one but me;

Said he would let his old pleasures all go
&nbsp Ever to live with his Dear.
Will's at the dance in the Club-room below,
&nbsp Shivering I wait for him here.

VII

AFTER THE FAIR

The singers are gone from the Cornmarket-place
&nbsp       &nbsp With their broadsheets of rhymes,
The street rings no longer in treble and bass
&nbsp       &nbsp With their skits on the times,
And the Cross, lately thronged, is a dim naked space
&nbsp That but echoes the stammering chimes.

From Clock-corner steps, as each quarter ding-dongs,
&nbsp       &nbsp Away the folk roam
By the "Hart" and Grey's Bridge into byways and "drongs,"
&nbsp       &nbsp Or across the ridged loam;
The younger ones shrilling the lately heard songs,
&nbsp The old saying, "Would we were home."

The shy-seeming maiden so mute in the fair
&nbsp       &nbsp Now rattles and talks,
And that one who looked the most swaggering there
&nbsp       &nbsp Grows sad as she walks,
And she who seemed eaten by cankering care
&nbsp In statuesque sturdiness stalks.

And midnight clears High Street of all but the ghosts
&nbsp       &nbsp Of its buried burghees,
From the latest far back to those old Roman hosts
&nbsp       &nbsp Whose remains one yet sees,
Who loved, laughed, and fought, hailed their friends, drank their toasts
&nbsp At their meeting-times here, just as these!