“There will I kiss
The bowle of blisse,
And drink mine everlasting fill
Upon every milken-hill;
My soul will be a-dry before;
But after that will thirst no more.”
Them lines ort to have been a comfort to him—mebby they wuz. But lines writ in a pleasant room to home, with the door shet up, don’t mebby sound jest the same on the scaffold or to the stake—dretful echoes sound all round ’em, loud voices that mebby drown out the words.
I spoze he thought sometimes durin’ them long days of his friends Shakespeare and Bacon. Mebby if there wuz any secrets between them two about the plays, he knew it. I wish I knew what it wuz—I’d give fifty cents freely if it could be made known to me.
I wonder what he thought of Elizabeth in them days. I wonder if he wuz sorry he throwed his cloak down for her to walk over. He tried to keep her from jest dampenin’ her feet a little, and she willin’ to cut his head off.