Classic Poem

crab:Where oxen do low and apples do grow,
Where corn is sown and grass is mown,
Where pigeons do fly and rooks nestle high,
Fate give me for life a place;
gill:Where hay is well cocked and udders are stroked,
Where duck and drake cry quack, quack, quack,
Where turkeys lay eggs and sows suckle pigs,
Oh, there I would pass my days.
crab:On nought we will feed
gill:But what we do breed;
crab:And wear on our backs
gill:The wool of our flocks.
crab:And though linen feel
gill:Rough, spun from the wheel,
'Tis cleanly, though coarse it comes.
crab:Town follies and cullies, and Mollies and Dollies,
For ever adieu and for ever;
gill:And beaus that in boxes lie nuzzling their doxies,
In wigs that hang down to their bums.

crab:Adieu, the Pall Mall, the Park and Canal,
St. James's Square and flaunters there,
The gaming-house too, where high dice and low
Are managed by all degrees.
gill:Goodbye to the knight was bubbled last night,
That keeps a blowze and beats his spouse,
And now in great haste, to pay what he lost,
Sends home to cut down the trees.
crab:And hey for the lad
gill:Improves ev'ry clod,
crab:That ne'er set his hand
gill:To bill or to bond,
crab:Nor barter his flocks
gill:For wine or the pox,
To chouse him of half his days;
crab:But fishing and fowling, hunting and bowling,
His pastimes are ever and ever,
gill:Whose lips when ye buss 'em
Smell like the bean-blossom;
Ah, he 'tis shall have my praise.

crab:To taverns where grow sour apple and sloe
A long adieu, and farewell too
The house of the great, whose cook has no meat
And butler can't quench my thirst;
gill:Goodbye to the Change, where rantipoles range,
Farewell cold tea and ratafie,
Hyde Park too, where Pride in coaches will ride,
Although they be choked with dust.
crab:Farewell the law-gown,
gill:The plague of the town,
crab:And friends of the Crown
gill:Cried up or run down.
crab:And city jackdaws,
gill:That fain would make laws
To measure by yards and ells;
crab:Stockjobbers and swabbers, and toasters and roasters,
For ever adieu and for ever;
gill:We find what you're doing and home we're a-going,
And so you may ring the bells.