But whether from too little thought, Or too much fealty to the bowl, A dim reward was all he got For sitting up with Old King Cole. "Though mine," the father mused aloud, "Are not the sons I would have chosen, Shall I, less evilly endowed, By their infirmity be frozen? "They'll have a bad end, I'll agree, But I was never born to groan; For I can see what I can see, And I'm accordingly alone. With open heart and open door, I love my friends, I like my neighbors; But if I try to tell you more, Your doubts will overmatch my labors. "This pipe would never make me calm, This bowl my grief would never drown. For grief like mine there is no balm In Gilead, or in Tilbury Town. And if I see what I can see, I know not any way to blind it; Nor more if any way may be For you to grope or fly to find it. "There may be room for ruin yet, And ashes for a wasted love; Or, like One whom you may forget, I may have meat you know not of. And if I'd rather live than weep Meanwhile, do you find that surprising? Why, bless my soul, the man's asleep! That's good. The sun will soon be rising." Ben Jonson Entertains a Man from Stratford You are a friend then, as I make it out, Of our man Shakespeare, who alone of us Will put an ass's head in Fairyland As he would add a shilling to more shillings, All most harmonious,--and out of his Miraculous inviolable increase Fills Ilion, Rome, or any town you like Of olden time with timeless Englishmen; And I must wonder what you think of him-- All you down there where your small Avon flows By Stratford, and where you're an Alderman. Some, for a guess, would have him riding back To be a farrier there, or say a dyer; Or maybe one of your adept surveyors; Or like enough the wizard of all tanners. Not you--no fear of that; for I discern In you a kindling of the flame that saves-- The nimble element, the true phlogiston; I see it, and was told of it, moreover, By our discriminate friend himself, no other. Had you been one of the sad average, As he would have it,--meaning, as I take it, The sinew and the solvent of our Island, You'd not be buying beer for this Terpander's Approved and estimated friend Ben Jonson; He'd never foist it as a part of his Contingent entertainment of a townsman While he goes off rehearsing, as he must, If he shall ever be the Duke of Stratford. And my words are no shadow on your town-- Far from it; for one town's as like another As all are unlike London. Oh, he knows it,-- And there's the Stratford in him; he denies it, And there's the Shakespeare in him. So, God help him! I tell him he needs Greek; but neither God Nor Greek will help him.