and they praise the sun
and when he goes down
their praising is done
and they fold up their crown
and they sleep every one
till over the plain
he’s shining amain
and they’re at it again
praising and praising
such low songs raising
that no one hears them
but the sun who rears them
and the sheep that bite them
are the quietest sheep
awake or asleep
with the merriest bleat
and the little lambs
are the merriest lambs
they forget to eat
for the frolic in their feet
and the lambs and their dams
are the whitest sheep
with the woolliest wool
and the longest wool
and the trailingest tails
and they shine like snow
in the grasses that grow
by the singing river
that sings forever
and the sheep and the lambs
are merry forever
because the river
sings and they drink it
and the lambs and their dams
are quiet
and white
because of their diet
for what they bite
is buttercups yellow
and daisies white
and grass as green
as the river can make it
with wind as mellow
to kiss it and shake it
as never was seen
but here in the hollows
beside the river
where all the swallows
are merriest of fellows
for the nests they make
with the clay they cake
in the sunshine bake
till they are like bone
as dry in the wind
as a marble stone
so firm they bind
the grass in the clay
that dries in the wind
the sweetest wind
that blows by the river
flowing forever
but never you find
whence comes the wind
that blows on the hollows
and over the shallows
where dip the swallows
alive it blows
the life as it goes
awake or asleep
into the river
that sings as it flows
and the life it blows
into the sheep
awake or asleep
with the woolliest wool
and the trailingest tails
and it never fails
gentle and cool
to wave the wool
and to toss the grass
as the lambs and the sheep
over it pass
and tug and bite
with their teeth so white
and then with the sweep
of their trailing tails
smooth it again
and it grows amain
and amain it grows
and the wind as it blows
tosses the swallows
over the hollows
and down on the shallows
till every feather
doth shake and quiver
and all their feathers
go all together
blowing the life
and the joy so rife
into the swallows
that skim the shallows
and have the yellowest children
for the wind that blows
is the life of the river
flowing forever
that washes the grasses
still as it passes
and feeds the daisies
the little white praises
and buttercups bonny
so golden and sunny
with butter and honey
that whiten the sheep
awake or asleep
that nibble and bite
and grow whiter than white
and merry and quiet
on the sweet diet
fed by the river
and tossed forever
by the wind that tosses
the swallow that crosses
over the shallows
dipping his wings
to gather the water
and bake the cake
that the wind shall make
as hard as a bone
as dry as a stone
it’s all in the wind
that blows from behind
and all in the river
that flows forever
and all in the grasses
and the white daisies
and the merry sheep
awake or asleep
and the happy swallows
skimming the shallows
and it’s all in the wind
that blows from behind
Here Diamond became aware that his mother had stopped reading.
“Why don’t you go on, mother dear?” he asked.
“It’s such nonsense!” said his mother. “I believe it would go on forever.”
“That’s just what it did,” said Diamond.
“What did?” she asked.
“Why, the river. That’s almost the very tune it used to sing.”
His mother was frightened, for she thought the fever was coming on again. So she did not contradict him.
“Who made that poem?” asked Diamond.
“I don’t know,” she answered. “Some silly woman for her children, I suppose—and then thought it good enough to print.”
“She must have been at the back of the north wind some time or other, anyhow,” said Diamond. “She couldn’t have got a hold of it anywhere else. That’s just how it went.” And he began to chant bits of it here and there; but his mother said nothing for fear of making him, worse; and she was very glad indeed when she saw her brother-in-law jogging along in his little cart. They lifted Diamond in, and got up themselves, and away they went, “home again, home again, home again,” as Diamond sang. But he soon grew quiet, and before they reached Sandwich he was fast asleep and dreaming of the country at the back of the north wind.
XIV
Old Diamond
After this Diamond recovered so fast, that in a few days he was quite able to go home as soon as his father had a place for them to go. Now his father having saved a little money, and finding that no situation offered itself, had been thinking over a new plan. A strange occurrence it was which turned his thoughts in that direction. He had a friend in the Bloomsbury region, who lived by letting out cabs and horses to the cabmen. This man, happening to meet him one day as he was returning from an unsuccessful application, said to him:
“Why don’t you set up for yourself now—in the cab line, I mean?”
“I haven’t enough for that,” answered Diamond’s father.
“You must have saved a goodish bit, I should think. Just come home with me now and look at a horse I can let you have cheap. I bought him only a few weeks ago, thinking he’d do for a Hansom, but I was wrong. He’s got bone enough for a wagon, but a wagon ain’t a Hansom. He ain’t got go enough for a Hansom. You see parties as takes Hansoms wants to go like the wind, and he ain’t got wind enough, for he ain’t so young as he once was. But for a four-wheeler as takes families and their luggages, he’s the very horse. He’d carry a small house any day. I bought him cheap, and I’ll sell him cheap.”
“Oh, I don’t want him,” said Diamond’s father. “A body must have time to think over an affair of so much importance. And there’s the cab too. That would come to a deal of money.”
“I could fit you there, I daresay,” said his friend. “But come and look at the animal, anyhow.”
“Since I lost my own old pair, as was Mr. Coleman’s,” said Diamond’s father, turning to accompany the cab-master, “I ain’t almost got the heart to look a horse in the face. It’s a thousand pities to part man and horse.”
“So it is,” returned
