The Wassail

Give way, give way, ye gates, and win An easy blessing to your bin And basket, by our entering in. May both with manchet stand replete; Your larders, too, so hung with meat, That though a thousand, thousand eat, Yet, ere twelve moons shall whirl about Their silv'ry spheres, there's none may doubt But more's sent in than was served out. Next, may your dairies prosper so, As that your pans no ebb may know; But if they do, the more to flow, Like to a solemn sober stream, Bank'd all with lilies, and the cream Of sweetest cowslips filling them. Then may your plants be press'd with fruit, Nor bee or hive you have be mute, But sweetly sounding like a lute. Last, may your harrows, shares, and ploughs, Your stacks, your stocks, your sweetest mows, All prosper by your virgin-vows. Alas! we bless, but see none here, That brings us either ale or beer; In a dry-house all things are near. Let's leave a longer time to wait, Where rust and cobwebs bind the gate; And all live here with needy fate; Where chimneys do for ever weep For want of warmth, and stomachs keep With noise the servants' eyes from sleep. It is in vain to sing, or stay Our free feet here, but we'll away: Yet to the Lares this we'll say: 'The time will come when you'll be sad, 'And reckon this for fortune bad,