I see him yet, that grey old man,
Whose fiddle made many a winter night
Pass by as only fiddlers can,
With reels and jigs as swift as light;
I see him still, as if to-day
He sat beside me, hale and strong,
And question'd, 'What am I to play?'
And drew the bow the strings along.
He sits within his elbow chair,
The fiddle laid across his knee;
He runs his fingers through his hair,
And quaintly asks, 'What news may be?'
He takes a snuff; the box careers
Around us, till the powder speaks,
And we must bow to feel the tears
Make mimic Derbies down our cheeks.
He tells us many a jest the while
His small blue sparkling eye peeps out,
And the dry shadow of a smile
Plays all his pucker'd cheek about;
Quaint stories of the olden times,
And quips, and humours, without end,
All dress'd up as I dress my rhymes
Before I send them to the Friend.
He takes the fiddle up, he brings
Each tone to its most perfect part;
He lays the bow along the strings,
And his whole soul is in his art;
He plays, with all his skill and show,
Our favourite reels and dear strathspeys,
Then gives a flourish with the bow,
And looks around to claim our praise.
Ah, heart! but he shall play no more,
And the old light has left our touch,
Or I should tempt the Stygian shore,
And draw him from King Pluto's clutch;
For others here who scrape and chime
Are only fit to make me sick—
Dull fools, who, using Jeffrey's rhyme,
'Move nothing but their fiddlestick.'
Well, well; we miss him from the street,
And in our coming nights of mirth
No more his fiddle, brisk and sweet,
Shall draw us to his silent hearth.
Yet rest his dust; and we behind,
Who yet in fancy hear him play,
May pause at times, and call to mind
The village Orpheus pass'd away.