Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By Charles HenryWebb

583 Dum Vivimus Vigilemus

TURN out more ale, turn up the light;

I will not go to bed to-night.

Of all the foes that man should dread

The first and worst one is a bed.

Friends I have had both old and young,

And ale we drank and songs we sung:

Enough you know when this is said,

That, one and all,—they died in bed.

In bed they died and I ’ll not go

Where all my friends have perished so.

Go you who glad would buried be,

But not to-night a bed for me.

For me to-night no bed prepare,

But set me out my oaken chair.

And bid no other guests beside

The ghosts that shall around me glide;

In curling smoke-wreaths I shall see

A fair and gentle company.

Though silent all, rare revellers they,

Who leave you not till break of day.

Go you who would not daylight see,

But not to-night a bed for me:

For I ’ve been born and I ’ve been wed—

All of man’s peril comes of bed.

And I ’ll not seek—whate’er befall—

Him who unbidden comes to all.

A grewsome guest, a lean-jawed wight—

God send he do not come to-night!

But if he do, to claim his own,

He shall not find me lying prone;

But blithely, bravely, sitting up,

And raising high the stirrup-cup.

Then if you find a pipe unfilled,

An empty chair, the brown ale spilled;

Well may you know, though naught be said,

That I ’ve been borne away to bed.