| WHEN Susan's work was done, she'd sit | |
| With one fat guttering candle lit, | |
| And window opened wide to win | |
| The sweet night air to enter in; | |
| There, with a thumb to keep her place | 5 |
| She'd read, with stern and wrinkled face. | |
| Her mild eyes gliding very slow | |
| Across the letters to and fro, | |
| While wagged the guttering candle flame | |
| In the wind that through the window came. | 10 |
| And sometimes in the silence she | |
| Would mumble a sentence audibly, | |
| Or shake her head as if to say, | |
| 'You silly souls, to act this way!' | |
| And never a sound from night I'd hear, | 15 |
| Unless some far-off cock crowed clear; | |
| Or her old shuffling thumb should turn | |
| Another page; and rapt and stern, | |
| Through her great glasses bent on me | |
| She'd glance into reality; | 20 |
| And shake her round old silvery head, | |
| With—'You!—I thought you was in bed!'— | |
| Only to tilt her book again, | |
| And rooted in Romance remain. | |
