Puck of Pook's Hill Read online

  PUCK'S SONG

  _See you the dimpled track that runs,_ _All hollow through the wheat?_ _O that was where they hauled the guns_ _That smote King Philip's fleet._

  _See you our little mill that clacks,_ _So busy by the brook?_ _She has ground her corn and paid her tax_ _Ever since Domesday Book._

  _See you our stilly woods of oak,_ _And the dread ditch beside?_ _O that was where the Saxons broke,_ _On the day that Harold died._

  _See you the windy levels spread_ _About the gates of Rye?_ _O that was where the Northmen fled,_ _When Alfred's ships came by._

  _See you our pastures wide and lone,_ _Where the red oxen browse?_ _O there was a City thronged and known,_ _Ere London boasted a house._

  _And see you, after rain, the trace_ _Of mound and ditch and wall?_ _O that was a Legion's camping-place,_ _When Caesar sailed from Gaul._

  _And see you marks that show and fade,_ _Like shadows on the Downs?_ _O they are the lines the Flint Men made,_ _To guard their wondrous towns._

  _Trackway and Camp and City lost,_ _Salt Marsh where now is corn;_ _Old Wars, old Peace, old Arts that cease,_ _And so was England born!_

  _She is not any common Earth,_ _Water or wood or air,_ _But Merlin's Isle of Gramarye,_ _Where you and I will fare._

  WELAND'S SWORD