ong.
They have the secret of the Rocks,
And the oldest kind of song.

But the men that live in the South Country
Are the kindest and most wise,
They get their laughter from the loud surf,
And the faith in their happy eyes
Comes surely from our Sister the Spring
When over the sea she flies;
The violets suddenly bloom at her feet,
She blesses us with surprise.

I never get between the pines
But I smell the Sussex air;
Nor I never come on a belt of sand
But my home is there.
And along the sky the line of the Downs
So noble and so bare.

A lost thing could I never find,
Nor a broken thing mend:
And I fear I shall be all alone
When I get towards the end.
Who will there be to comfort me
Or who will be my friend?

I will gather and carefully make my friends
Of the men of the Sussex Weald;
They watch the stars from silent folds,
They stiffly plough the field.
By them and the God of the South Country
My poor soul shall be healed.

If I ever become a rich man,
Or if ever I grow to be old,
I will build a house with deep thatch
To shelter me from the cold,
And there shall the Sussex songs be sung
And the story of Sussex told.

I will hold my house in the high wood
Within a walk of the sea,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Shall sit and drink with me.

_Anthony C. Deane_

Anthony C. Deane was born in 1870 and was the Seatonian prizeman in
1905 at Clare College, Cambridge. He has been Vicar of All Saints,
Ennismore Gardens, since 1916. His long list of light verse and
essays includes several excellent parodies, the most delightful being
found in his _New Rhymes for Old_ (1901).

THE BALLAD OF THE _BILLYCOCK_

It was the good ship _Billycock_, with thirteen men aboard,
Athirst to grapple with their country's foes,--
A crew, 'twill be admitted, not numerically fitted
To navigate a battleship in prose.

It was the good ship _Billycock_ put out from Plymouth Sound,
While lustily the gallant heroes cheered,
And all the air was ringing with the merry bo'sun's singing,
Till in the gloom of night she disappeared.

But when the morning broke on her, behold, a dozen ships,
A dozen ships of France around her lay,
(Or, if that isn't plenty, I will gladly