Upon the Lonely Moor
I met an aged, aged man
Upon the lonely
moor:
I knew I was a
gentleman,
And he was but a
boor.
So I stopped and roughly questioned him,
Come, tell me how you live!
But his words impressed my ear no more
Than if it were a sieve.
He said, I look for
soap-bubbles,
That lie among the
wheat,
And bake them into
mutton-pies,
And
sell them in the street.
I sell them unto men, he said,
Who
sail on
stormy seas;
And thats the way I get my bread--
A
trifle,
if you please.
But I was thinking of a way
To multiply by ten,
And always, in the answer, get
The question back again.
I did not hear a word he said,
But kicked that
old man calm,
And said, Come, tell me how you live!
And
pinched him in the arm.
His
accents mild took up the tale:
He said, I go my ways,
And when I find a
mountain-rill,
I set it in a
blaze.
And thence they make a stuff they call
Rowlands
Macassar Oil;
But fourpence-halfpenny is all
They give me for my toil.
But I was thinking of a plan
To paint ones gaiters green,
So much the colour of the grass
That they could neer be seen.
I gave his ear a sudden box,
And
questioned him again,
And
tweaked his grey and
reverend locks,
And put him into pain.
He said, I hunt for
haddocks eyes
Among the heather bright,
And work them into
waistcoat-buttons
In the silent night.
And these I do not sell for gold,
Or coin of
silver-mine,
But for a copper-halfpenny,
And that will purchase nine.
I sometimes dig for
buttered rolls,
Or set limed twigs for
crabs;
I sometimes search the flowery
knolls
For wheels of hansom cabs].
And thats the way (he gave a wink)
I get my living here,
And very gladly will I drink
Your Honours health in beer.
I heard him then, for I had just
Completed my design
To keep the
Menai bridge from rust
By boiling it in wine.
I duly thanked him, ere I went,
For all his stories queer,
But chiefly for his kind intent
To drink my health in beer.
And now if eer by chance I put
My fingers into
glue,
Or madly squeeze a right-hand foot
Into a left-hand shoe;
Or if a statement I aver
Of which I am not sure,
I think of that strange wanderer
Upon the lonely
moor.
Lewis Carroll, 1856