Gratitude
Eternal gratitude — a long, thin word:
When meant, oftenest left unheard:
When light on the tongue, light in the purse too;
Of curious metallurgy: when coined true
It glitters not, is neither large nor small:
More worth than rubies — less, times, than a ball.
Not gift, nor willed: yet through its wide range
Buys what it buys exact, and leaves no change.
Old Gurney had it, won on a hot day
With ale, from a glib-voiced Gipsy by the way.
He held it lightly: for 'twas a rum start
To find a hedgeling who had still a heart:
So put it down for twist of a beggar's tongue.
He had not felt the heat: how the dust stung
A face June-roasted: he saw not the look
Aslant the gift-mug; how the hand shook.
Yet the words filled his head, and he grew merry
And whistled from the Boar to Wryebrook ferry,
And chaffed the ferryman when the hawser creaked,
Or slipping bilge showed where the planks leaked;
— Lent hand himself, till doubly hard the barge
Butted its nose in mud of the farther marge.
When Gurney leapt to shore he found — dismay!
He had no tuppence — (Tuppence was to pay
To sulky Ferryman.) — " Naught have I, " says he,
" Naught but the gratitude of Tammas Lee
Given one hour. " — Sulky Charon grinned:
" Done, " said he, " done: I take it — all of it, mind. "
" Done, " cries Jan Gurney. Down the road he went,
But by the ford left all his merriment.
That is the tale of midday chaffering:
How Charon took, and Gurney lost the thing.
Then Charon gave it for his youngest daughter
To a tall lad who saved her out of the water
(Being old and mean, he had none of his own to give,
So passed on Tammas's, glad to see her live):
Then the young farmer paid his quarter's rent
With that one coin, when all else was spent,
And the Squire kept it, for some goldless debt ...
For aught I know, it wanders current yet.
But Tammas was no angel in disguise:
He stole Squire's chickens — often: he told lies,
Robbed Charon's garden, burnt young Farmer's ricks
And played the village many lousy tricks.
No children sniffled, and no dog cried,
When full of oaths and smells, he died.
When meant, oftenest left unheard:
When light on the tongue, light in the purse too;
Of curious metallurgy: when coined true
It glitters not, is neither large nor small:
More worth than rubies — less, times, than a ball.
Not gift, nor willed: yet through its wide range
Buys what it buys exact, and leaves no change.
Old Gurney had it, won on a hot day
With ale, from a glib-voiced Gipsy by the way.
He held it lightly: for 'twas a rum start
To find a hedgeling who had still a heart:
So put it down for twist of a beggar's tongue.
He had not felt the heat: how the dust stung
A face June-roasted: he saw not the look
Aslant the gift-mug; how the hand shook.
Yet the words filled his head, and he grew merry
And whistled from the Boar to Wryebrook ferry,
And chaffed the ferryman when the hawser creaked,
Or slipping bilge showed where the planks leaked;
— Lent hand himself, till doubly hard the barge
Butted its nose in mud of the farther marge.
When Gurney leapt to shore he found — dismay!
He had no tuppence — (Tuppence was to pay
To sulky Ferryman.) — " Naught have I, " says he,
" Naught but the gratitude of Tammas Lee
Given one hour. " — Sulky Charon grinned:
" Done, " said he, " done: I take it — all of it, mind. "
" Done, " cries Jan Gurney. Down the road he went,
But by the ford left all his merriment.
That is the tale of midday chaffering:
How Charon took, and Gurney lost the thing.
Then Charon gave it for his youngest daughter
To a tall lad who saved her out of the water
(Being old and mean, he had none of his own to give,
So passed on Tammas's, glad to see her live):
Then the young farmer paid his quarter's rent
With that one coin, when all else was spent,
And the Squire kept it, for some goldless debt ...
For aught I know, it wanders current yet.
But Tammas was no angel in disguise:
He stole Squire's chickens — often: he told lies,
Robbed Charon's garden, burnt young Farmer's ricks
And played the village many lousy tricks.
No children sniffled, and no dog cried,
When full of oaths and smells, he died.
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