'When I was young, a single man,
And after youthful follies ran,
Though little given to care and thought,
Yet so it was, an ewe I bought;
And other sheep from her I raised,
As healthy sheep as you might see;
And then I married, and was rich
As I could wish to be;
Of sheep I number'd a full score,
And every year increas'd my store.
4
'Year after year my stock it grew;
And from this one, this single ewe,
Full fifty comely sheep I raised,
As fine a flock as ever grazed!
Upon the Quantock Hills they fed;
They throve, and we at home did thrive:
—This lusty lamb of all my store
Is all that is alive;
And now I care not if we die,
And perish all of poverty.
5
'Six children, sir, had I to feed;
Hard labour, in a time of need!
My pride was tamed, and in our grief,
I of the parish ask'd relief,
They said I was a wealthy man;
My sheep upon the uplands fed,
And it was fit that thence I took
Whereof to buy us bread.
'Do this; how can we give to you,'
They cried, 'what to the poor is due?'
6
'I sold a sheep, as they had said,
And bought my little children bread,
And they were healthy with their food;
For me—it never did me good.
A woful time it was for me,
To see the end of all my gains,
The pretty flock which I had rear'd
With all my care and pains,
To see it melt like snow away—
For me it was a woful day.
7
Another still! and still another!
A little lamb, and then its mother!
It was a vein that never stopp'd—
Like blood-drops from my heart they dropp'd,
Till thirty were not left alive;
They dwindled, dwindled, one by one;
And I may say that many a time
I wish'd they all were gone;
Reckless of what might come at last,
Were but the bitter struggle past.