REWARDS AND FAIRIES
By Rudyard Kipling
Contents
A Charm Introduction Cold Iron Cold Iron Gloriana The Two Cousins The Looking-Glass The Wrong Thing A Truthful Song King Henry VII and the Shipwrights Marklake Witches The Way through the Woods Brookland Road The Knife and the Naked Chalk The Run of the Downs Song of the Men’s Side Brother Square-Toes Philadelphia If-- Rs ‘A Priest in Spite of Himself’ A St Helena Lullaby ‘Poor Honest Men’ The Conversion of St Wilfrid Eddi’s Service Song of the Red War-Boat A Doctor of Medicine An Astrologer’s Song ‘Our Fathers of Old’ Simple Simon The Thousandth Man Frankie’s Trade The Tree of Justice The Ballad of Minepit Shaw A Carol
A Charm
Take of English earth as much As either hand may rightly clutch. In the taking of it breathe Prayer for all who lie beneath-- Not the great nor well-bespoke, But the mere uncounted folk Of whose life and death is none Report or lamentation. Lay that earth upon thy heart, And thy sickness shall depart!
It shall sweeten and make whole Fevered breath and festered soul; It shall mightily restrain Over-busy hand and brain; it shall ease thy mortal strife ‘Gainst the immortal woe of life, Till thyself restored shall prove By what grace the Heavens do move.
Take of English flowers these-- Spring’s full-faced primroses, Summer’s wild wide-hearted rose, Autumn’s wall-flower of the close, And, thy darkness to illume, Winter’s bee-thronged ivy-bloom. Seek and serve them where they bide From Candlemas to Christmas-tide, For these simples used aright Shall restore a failing sight.
These shall cleanse and purify Webbed and inward-turning eye; These shall show thee treasure hid, Thy familiar fields amid, At thy threshold, on thy hearth, Or about thy daily path; And reveal (which is thy need) Every man a King indeed!