Tales of a Wayside Inn : Part 3. Interlude 7

Touched by the pathos of these rhymes, The Theologian said: 'All praise Be to the ballads of old times And to the bards of simple ways, Who walked with Nature hand in hand, Whose country was their Holy Land, Whose singing robes were homespun brown From looms of their own native town, Which they were not ashamed to wear, And not of silk or sendal gay, Nor decked with fanciful array Of cockle-shells from Outre-Mer.' To whom the Student answered: 'Yes; All praise and honor! I confess That bread and ale, home-baked, home-brewed, Are wholesome and nutritious food, But not enough for all our needs; Poets--the best of them--are birds Of passage; where their instinct leads They range abroad for thoughts and words, And from all climes bring home the seeds That germinate in flowers or weeds. They are not fowls in barnyards born To cackle o'er a grain of corn; And, if you shut the horizon down To the small limits of their town, What do you but degrade your bard Till he at last becomes as one Who thinks the all-encircling sun Rises and sets in his back yard?' The Theologian said again: 'It may be so; yet I maintain That what is native still is best, And little care I for the rest. 'T is a long story; time would fail To tell it, and the hour is late; We will not waste it in debate, But listen to our Landlord's tale.' And thus the sword of Damocles Descending not by slow degrees, But suddenly, on the Landlord fell, Who blushing, and with much demur And many vain apologies, Plucking up heart, began to tell The Rhyme of one Sir Christopher.