And to-day on the downs, in the wind, the hawks, the grasses, In blood and air, Something passes me and cries as it passes, On the chalk downland bare. XXII. No man takes the farm, Nothing grows there; The ivy's arm Strangles the rose there. Old Farmer Kyrle Farmed there the last; He beat his girl (It's seven years past). After market it was He beat his girl; He liked his glass, Old Farmer Kyrle. Old Kyrle's son Said to his father: "Now, dad, you ha' done, I'll kill you rather! "Stop beating sister, Or by God I'll kill you!" Kyrle was full of liquor-- Old Kyrle said: "Will you?" Kyrle took his cobb'd stick And beat his daughter; He said: "I'll teach my chick As a father oughter." Young Will, the son, Heard his sister shriek; He took his gun Quick as a streak. He said: "Now, dad, Stop, once for all!" He was a good lad, Good at kicking the ball. His father clubbed The girl on the head. Young Will upped And shot him dead. "Now, sister," said Will, "I've a-killed father, As I said I'd kill. O my love, I'd rather "A-kill him again Than see you suffer. O my little Jane, Kiss good-bye to your brother. "I won't see you again, Nor the cows homing, Nor the mice in the grain, Nor the primrose coming, "Nor the fair, nor folk, Nor the summer flowers Growing on the wold, Nor ought that's ours. "Not Tib the cat, Not Stub the mare, Nor old dog Pat, Never anywhere. "For I'll be hung In Gloucester prison When the bell's rung And the sun's risen." * * * They hanged Will As Will said; With one thrill They choked him dead. Jane walked the wold Like a grey gander; All grown old She would wander. She died soon: At high-tide, At full moon, Jane died. The brook chatters As at first; The farm it waters Is accurst. No man takes it, Nothing grows there; Blood straiks it, A ghost goes there. XXIII. A hundred years ago they quarried for the stone here; The carts came through the wood by the track still plain; The drills show in the rock where the blasts were blown here, They show up dark after rain. Then the last cart of stone went away through the wood, To build the great house for some April of a woman, Till her beauty stood in stone, as her man's thought made it good, And the dumb rock was made human. The house still stands, but the April of its glory Is gone, long since, with the beauty that has gone; She wandered away west, it is an old sad story: It is best not talked upon. And the man has gone, too, but the quarry that he made, Whenever April comes as it came in old time, Is a dear delight to the man who loves a maid, For the primose comes from the lime....