Page:Barnes (1879) Poems of rural life in the Dorset dialect (combined).djvu/243

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CULVER DELL AND THE SQUIRE.
227

Why then they’ll veel our kindness drown
The thoughts ov all that meäde em frown.
An’ jaÿ o’ jaÿs will dry the tear
O’ sadness that do trickle here,
An’ nothèn mwore o’ life than love,
An’ peace, will then be know’d above.
Do good, vor that, when life’s a-vled,
Is still a pleasure to the dead.

CULVER DELL AND THE SQUIRE.

There’s noo pleäce I do like so well,
As Elem Knap in Culver Dell,
Where timber trees, wi’ lofty shouds,
Did rise avore the western clouds;
An’ stan’ ageän, wi’ veathery tops,
A-swaÿèn up in North-Hill Copse.
An’ on the east the mornèn broke
Above a dewy grove o’ woak:
An’ noontide shed its burnèn light
On ashes on the southern height;
An’ I could vind zome teäles to tell,
O’ former days in Culver Dell.

An’ all the vo’k did love so well
The good wold squire o’ Culver Dell,
That used to ramble drough the sheädes
O’ timber, or the burnèn gleädes,
An’ come at evenèn up the leäze
Wi’ red-ear’d dogs bezide his knees
An’ hold his gun, a-hangèn drough
His eärmpit, out above his tooe.
Wi’ kindly words upon his tongue,
Vor vo’k that met en, wold an’ young,
Vor he did know the poor so well
’S the richest vo’k in Culver Dell.