Drank of the rill and found it good,
Sitting at ease on a block of wood,
And blessed the place, and thenceforth never
The waters have ceased but they run for ever.
They burnt St. Crag, so the stories say,
And his ashes cast on the winds away,
But the well survives, and the block of wood
Stands--nay, stood where it always stood,
And still was the village's pride and glory
On the day of which I shall tell my story.
Gnarled and knotty and weather-stained,
Battered and cracked, it still remained;
And thither came,
Footsore and lame,
On an autumn evening a year ago
The wandering pedlar, Gipsy Joe.
Beside the block he stood and set
His table out on the well-stones wet.
"Who'll buy? Who'll buy?" was the call he cried
As the folk came flocking from every side;
For they knew their Gipsy Joe of old,
His free wild words and his laughter bold:
So high and low all gathered together
By the village well in the autumn weather,
Lured by the gipsy's bargain-chatter
And the reckless lilt of his hare-brained patter.
And there the Revd. Salvyn Bent,
The parish church's ornament,
Stood, as it chanced, in discontent,
And eyed with a look that was almost sinister