| |
| A MIGHTY growth! The countyside | |
| Lamented when the giant died, | |
| For England loves her trees: | |
| What misty legends round him cling! | |
| How lavishly he once did fling | 5 |
| His acorns to the breeze! | |
| |
| To strike a thousand roots in fame, | |
| To give the district half its name, | |
| The fiat could not hinder; | |
| Last spring he put forth one green bough,— | 10 |
| The red leaves hang there still,—but now | |
| His very props are tinder. | |
| |
| Elate, the thunderbolt he braved; | |
| Long centuries his branches waved | |
| A welcome to the blast: | 15 |
| An oak of broadest girth he grew, | |
| And woodman never dared to do | |
| What time has done at last. | |
| |
| The monarch wore a leafy crown, | |
| And wolves, ere wolves were hunted down, | 20 |
| Found shelter at his foot; | |
| Unnumbered squirrels gambolled free, | |
| Glad music filled the gallant tree | |
| From stem to topmost shoot. | |
| |
| And it were hard to fix the tale | 25 |
| Of when he first peered forth a frail | |
| Petitioner for dew; | |
| He took no ill from Saxon spade, | |
| The rabbit spared the tender blade, | |
| And valiantly he grew, | 30 |
| |
| And showed some inches from the ground | |
| When Saint Augustine came and found | |
| Us very proper Vandals; | |
| When nymphs owned bluer eyes than hose, | |
| When England measured men by blows, | 35 |
| And measured time by candles. | |
| |
| Worn pilgrims blessed his grateful shade | |
| Ere Richard led the first crusade, | |
| And maidens led the dance | |
| Where, boy and man, in summer time, | 40 |
| Sweet Chaucer pondered o’er his rhyme; | |
| And Robin Hood, perchance, | |
| |
| Stole hither to maid Marian | |
| (And if they did not come, one can | |
| At any rate suppose it); | 45 |
| They met beneath the mistletoe,— | |
| We did the same, and ought to know | |
| The reason why they chose it. | |
| |
| And this was called the traitors’ branch,— | |
| Stern Warwick hung six yeomen stanch | 50 |
| Along its mighty fork; | |
| Uncivil wars for them! The fair | |
| Red rose and white still bloom,—but where | |
| Are Lancaster and York? | |
| |
| A churchman once was England’s hope, | 55 |
| He saw that bold man beard the Pope; | |
| In persecution’s reign | |
| He mourned our martyrs at the stake, | |
| And sent his kin to sea with Drake, | |
| When Tudor humbled Spain. | 60 |
| |
| A time-worn tree, he could not bring | |
| His heart to screen the merry king, | |
| Or countenance his scandals; | |
| Then men were measured by their wit, | |
| And then the mimic statesmen lit | 65 |
| At either end their candles. | |
| |
| When Blake was busy with the Dutch | |
| They gave his poor old arms a crutch; | |
| And thrice four maids and men ate | |
| A meal within his rugged bark, | 70 |
| When Coventry bewitched the park, | |
| And Chatham swayed the senate. | |
| |
| His few remaining boughs were green, | |
| And dappled sunbeams danced between, | |
| Upon the dappled deer, | 75 |
| When, clad in black, a pair were met | |
| To read the Waterloo Gazette,— | |
| They mourned their darling here. | |
| |
| They joined their boy. The tree at last | |
| Lies prone,—discoursing of the past, | 80 |
| Some fancy-dreams awaking, | |
| Resigned, though headlong changes come, | |
| Though nations arm to tuck of drum, | |
| And dynasties are quaking. | |
| |
| Romantic spot! By honest pride | 85 |
| Of eld tradition sanctified; | |
| My pensive vigil keeping, | |
| I feel thy beauty like a spell, | |
| And thoughts, and tender thoughts, upwell, | |
| That fill my heart to weeping. * * * * * | 90 |
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