Nor looms t' weyve on,--
Edad! they're as good lost as fund."

VII.

Eawr Marget declares had hoo clooas to put on,
Hoo'd goo up to Lunnon an' talk to th' greet mon
An' if things were na awtered when there hoo had been,
Hoo's fully resolved t' sew up meawth an' eend;
Hoo's neawt to say again t' king,
But hoo loikes a fair thing,
An' hoo says hoo can tell when hoo's hurt.

*Clem; to starve with hunger.
"Hard is the choice, when the valiant
must eat their arms or CLEM."--BEN JONSON.
**To "pick ower," means to throw the shuttle in hand-loom weaving.

The air to which this is sung is a kind of droning recitative,
depending much on expression and feeling. To read it, it may,
perhaps, seem humorous; but it is that humour which is near akin to
pathos, and to those who have seen the distress it describes it is a
powerfully pathetic song. Margaret had both witnessed the
destitution, and had the heart to feel it, and withal, her voice was
of that rich and rare order, which does not require any great
compass of notes to make itself appreciated. Alice had her quiet
enjoyment of tears. But Margaret, with fixed eye, and earnest,
dreamy look, seemed to become more and more absorbed in realising to
herself the woe she had been describing, and which she felt might at
that very moment be suffering and hopeless within a short distance