Page 46 - Poetry-Country

Christmas

So now has come our joyful’st feast;
Let every man be jolly;
Each room with ivy leaves is drest,
And ev’ry post with holly.
Though some churls at our mirth repine,
Round our foreheads garlands twine,
And let us all be merry.
Now all our neighbors’ chimneys smoke,
And Christmas blocks are burning;
Their ovens they with baked meat choke,
And all their spits are turning.
Without the door let sorrow lie,
And if for cold it hap to die,
We’ll bury ‘t in a Christmas pie,
And evermore be merry.

Now ev’ry lad in wondrous trim,
And no man minds his labor;
Our lasses have provided them
A bagpipe and a tabor;
Young men and maids, and girls and boys,
Give life to one another’s joys;
And you, anon, shall by their noise
Perceive that they are merry.
Rank misers now their sparing shun;
Their halls of music soundeth;
And dogs thence with whole shoulders run,
For all things there aboundeth:
The country folks themselves advance,
With chowdy-muttons out of France;
And Jack shall pipe, and Gill shall dance,
And all the town be merry.

Ned Squash hath fetch’d his lands from pawn,
And all his best apparel;
Brisk Nell hath bought a ruff of lawn,
With dripping of the loin.
And those that hardly all the year
Had bread to eat, or rags to wear,

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