I
I awoke very sore from the gruelling adventures of the previous day. Being more hungry than was my wont, I quickly despatched the hunch of crusty bread and bit of cheese, which the highwayman had left me, and fared forth upon my journeying. My way lay adown a leafy lane, lined with hedgerows, gemmed with myriad sparkling dew drops, wherein birds sang a jubilant pæan. So faring forth, I crossed a small rustic bridge spanning a murmurous brook and so into a dense wood, whose twisted, writhen branches and myriad leaves made a dim twilight, wherein a wind dank and chill moaned fitfully, very dismal to hear.
I sought to flee these gloomy shades, but tripped and fell headlong into a leafy glade, where sat a small, fierce, quick, keen-eyed tinker a-tinkering.
“Oh!” said I, “pray pardon my intrusion.”
“’Old ’ard!” quoth he in mighty voice, “that’s a good word. I’m a poet myself. Wot d’ye think o’ this?
“Full fathom five my father lies
In Xanadu with Kubla Khan.
With a heigh and a ho and a hey nonny-no!
Night and day on me he cries
‘Go fetch to me a pint o’ wine!’
Cuckoo! Cuckoo!
So was it when my life began
So is it now that I’m a man
I’ve always had to chase the can.
Heigho, fair Rosaline!”
“Oh!” cried I, “you say that is original?”
“Aye, it is,” he answered.
“Strange how much you resemble your father,” quoth I, and left him.