Yorkshire Dialect Poems (1673-1915) and traditional poems

From "Snaith Marsh" (1754)

     Anonymous

     This was written at the time of the Enclosure Acts
     which robbed the peasent farmer of his rights to use Commons.

     Alas! will Roger e'er his sleep forgo,
     Afore larks sing, or early cocks 'gin Crow,
     As I've for thee, ungrateful maiden, done,
     To help thee milking, e'er day wark begun?
     And when thy well-stripp'd kye(1) would yield no more,
     Still on my head the reeking kit(2) I bore.
     And, Oh! bethink thee, then, what lovesome talk
     We've held together, ganging down the balk,
     Maund'ring(3) at time which would na for us stay,
     But now, I ween, maes(4) no such hast away.
     Yet, O! return eftsoon and ease my woe,
     And to some distant parish let us go,
     And there again them leetsome days restore,
     Where, unassail'd by meety(5) folk in power,
     Our cattle yet may feed, tho' Snaith Marsh be no more.
        But wae is me! I wot I fand(6) am grown,
     Forgetting Susan is already gone,
     And Roger aims e'er Lady Day to wed;
     The banns last Sunday in the church were bid.
     But let me, let me first i' t' churchyard lig,
     For soon I there must gang, my grief's so big.
     All others in their loss some comfort find;
     Though Ned's like me reduc'd, yet Jenny's kind,
     And though his fleece no more our parson taks,
     And roast goose, dainty food, our table lacks,
     Yet he, for tithes ill paid, gets better land,
     While I am ev'ry o' t' losing hand.
     My adlings wared,(7) and yet my rent to pay,
     My geese, like Susan's faith, flown far away;
     My cattle, like their master, lank and poor,
     My heart with hopeless love to pieces tore,
     And all these sorrows came syne(8) Snaith Marsh was no more

     1. Well-milked kine (cattle)  2. Pail  3. Finding Fault
     4. Makes  5. Mighty  6. Fond, Foolish  7. Earnings spent
     8. Since