THE HIGH TIDE ON THE COAST OF LINCOLNSHIRE—1571.
Jean Ingelow.
The old mayor climbed the belfry tower,
The ringers ran by two, by three:—
"Pull, if ye never pulled before,
Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he.
"Play up, play up, O Boston bells!
Ply all your changes, all your swells;
Play up 'The Brides of Enderby'!"
Men say it was a stolen tide;
The Lord that sent it, he knows all;
But in mine ears doth still abide
The message that the bells let fall:
And there was naught of strange, beside
The flights of mews and peewits pied
By millions crouched on the old sea wall.
I sat and spun within the door,
My thread brake off, I raised mine eyes;
The level sun, like ruddy ore,
Lay sinking in the barren skies,
And dark against day's golden death
She moved where Lindis wandereth,
My son's fair wife, Elizabeth.
"Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!" calling,
Ere the early dews were falling,
Far away I heard her song.
"Cusha! Cusha!" all along,
Where the reedy Lindis floweth,
Floweth, floweth;
From the meads where melick groweth
Faintly came her milking song,
"Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!" calling,
"For the dews will soon be falling;
Leave your meadow grasses mellow,
Mellow, mellow;
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow;
Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot;
Quit the stalks of parsley hollow,
Hollow, hollow;
Come up, Jetty, rise and follow,
From the clovers lift your head;
Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot,
Come up, Jetty, rise and follow,
Jetty, to the milking shed."