Ay: but not mine. What should a tinker’s trollop
Do in the house of Michael Barrasford,
But bring a blush to his children’s cheeks? God help them,
If they take after me, if they’ve a dash
Of Haggard blood—for ewe’s milk laced with brandy
Is like to curdle: or, happen, I should say,
God help their father!
Michael:
Mother, why should you go?
Why should you want to travel the ditch-bottom,
When you’ve a hearth to sit by, snug and clean?
Bell:
The fatted calf’s to be killed for the prodigal mother?
You’ve not the hard heart of the young cockrobin
That’s got no use for parents, once he’s mated:
But I’m, somehow, out of place within four walls,
Tied to one spot—that never wander the world.
I long for the rumble of wheels beneath me; to hear
The clatter and creak of the lurching caravan;
And the daylong patter of raindrops on the roof:
Ay, and the gossip of nights about the campfire—
The give-and-take of tongues: mine’s getting stiff
For want of use, and spoiling for a fight.
Michael:
Nay: still as nimble and nippy as a flea!
Bell:
But, I could talk, at one time! There are days
When the whole world’s hoddendoon and draggletailed,
Drooked through and through; and blury, gurly days
When the wind blows snell: but it’s something to be stirring,
And not shut up between four glowering walls,
Like blind white faces; and you never ken
What traveller your wayside fire will draw
Out of the night, to tell outlandish tales,
Or crack a jest, or start quarrel with you,
Till the words bite hot as ginger on the tongue.
Anger’s the stuff to loose a tongue grown rusty:
And keep it in good fettle for all chances.
I’m sick of dozing by a dumb hearthstone—
And the peat, with never a click or crackle in it—
Famished for news.
Michael: