"Steevy! Wheer be ye got to?" roared one old fellow with very white hair and a very red face—"ye're not so small as ye can hide in yer mother's thimble!"
A young giant of a man stood up in response to this adjuration, blushing and smiling bashfully.
"Here I be!"
"Sing away, lad, sing away!"
"Wet yer pipe, and whistle!"
"Tune up, my blackbird!"
Steevy, thus adjured, straightened himself to his full stature of over six feet and drank off a cupful of ale. Then he began in a remarkably fine and mellow tenor:
"Would you choose a wife
For a happy life,
Leave the town and the country take;
Where Susan and Doll,
And Jenny and Moll,
Follow Harry and John,
While harvest goes on,
And merrily, merrily rake!"
"The lass give me here,
As brown as my beer,
That knows how to govern a farm;
That can milk a cow,
Or farrow a sow,
Make butter and cheese,
And gather green peas,
And guard the poultry from harm."
"This, this is the girl,
Worth rubies and pearl,
The wife that a home will make!
We farmers need
No quality breed,
But a woman that's won
While harvest goes on,
And we merrily, merrily rake!"