it well,
Riches will make you richer, and the world
Will prosper in your own prosperity.
The miser, like the cold and barren moon,
Shines with a fruitless light. The spendthrift fool
Flits like a Jack-o-Lent over quags and fens;
But he that's wisely rich gathers his gold
Into a fruitful and unwasting sun
That spends its glory on a thousand fields
And blesses all the world. Take it and go.'

Blankly, as in a dream, Whittington stared.
'How should I take it, sir? The ship was yours,
And ...'
'Ay, the ship was mine; but in that ship
Your stake was richer than we knew. 'Tis yours.'
'Then,' answered Whittington, 'if this wealth be mine,
Who but an hour ago was all so poor,
I know one way to make me richer still.'
He gathered up the glittering sack of gems,
Turned to the halpace, where his green-gowned maid
Stood in the glory of the coloured panes.
He thrust the splendid load into her arms,
Muttering--'Take it, lady! Let me be poor!
But rich, at least, in that you not despise
The waif you saved.'
--'Despise you, Whittington?'--
'O, no, not in the sight of God! But I
Grow tired of waiting for the Judgment Day!
I am but a man. I am a scullion now;
But I would like, only for half an hour,
To stand upright and say "I am a king!"
Take it!'
And, as they stood, a little apart,
Their eyes were married in one swift level look,
Silent, but all that souls could say was said.

* * * *

And
'I know a way,' said the Bell of St. Martin's.
'Tell it, and be quick,' laughed the prentices below!
'Whittington shall marry her, marry her, marry her!
Peal for a wedding,' said the big Bell of Bow.

He shall take a kingdom up, and cast it on the sea again;
He shall have his caravels to traffic for him now;
He shall see his royal sails rolling up from Araby,
And the crest--a honey-bee--golden at the prow.

Whittington! Whittington! The world is all a fairy tale!--
Even so we sang for him.--But O, the tale is true!
Whittington he married her, and on his merry marriage-day,
O, we sang, we sang for him, like lavrocks in the blue.

Far away from London, these happy prentice lovers
Wandered through the fern to his western home again,