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At every lift his spade threw out
A thousand waggon load, no doubt
O ! had he labour'd till to-morrow,
His envious work had wrought much sorrow ;
The Weald, with verdant beauty grae'd,
O'erwhelmed—a sad and watery waste 1
But so it chanced, a good old dame, Whose deed has long outliv'd her name, Wak'd by the cramp, at midnight hour, Or just escaped the night mare's power, Rose from her humble bed, when lo ! She heard Nick's terrible ado ! And by the star-light, faintly spied This wicked wight, and dike so wide ? She knew him by his mighty size, His tail, his horns, his saucer eyes; And while, with wonderment amaz'd, At workman and at work she gaz'd, Swift cross her mind a thought then flew, That she, by strategem, might do A deed, which luckily should save Her country from a watery grave ; By his own weapons fairly beating The father of all lies and cheating!
Forth from her casement in a minute, A sieve, with flaming candle in it, She held to view:— and simple Nick, Who ne'er suspecting such a trick, (All rognes are fools) when first his sight A full orb'd luminary bright Beheld—he fled—his work undone— Scar'd at the sight of a new Sun; And smuttering curses that the day Should drive him from his work away!
Night after night, this knowing dame Watch'd—but again Nick never came ! Who now dare call the action evil To hold a Candle to the Devil ?
" The Brighton fisherman at the Dyke," is a somewhat amusing anecdote. It is told that a fisherman accompanied a bird-catching party, and, during the time they were engaged in their pursuits, strolled from them, lost his way, and eventually found himself at this |
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