The Hand-Bell Ringers
OR WITHIN AND WITHOUT
i.
Last night the ringers came over the moor
To ring us in Christmas-tide;
They entered in at our garden door:
We sat and watched the yule logs roar,
They stood on the grass outside.
We sat within, i' the warmth and light,
The fire leapt red and blue;
Each frosted lamp was a moon of white
The growing plants half hid from sight.
Letting the radiance through.
The white and the red lights filled the room,
And flickered on bracket and ledge,
On the pale sweet pinks and the cactus bloom,
With its crimson flush, and the leafy gloom
O' the sill's geranium-hedge.
We sat, making merry, shut in from the rain
And the Christmas cold outside.
But hark ! the carol goes pealing again;
The ringers are out in the cold, 'tis plain.
Ringing in Christmas-tide,
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