Songs of the Ridings | Page 8

satire; and for all these dialect is a fitting instrument. It
possesses in the highest degree directness of utterance and racy vigour.
How much of their force would the "Biglow Papers" of J. R. Lowell
lose if they were transcribed from the Yankee dialect into standard
English!
But the highest quality of dialect speech, and that which renders it
pre-eminently fitted for poetic use, is its intimate association with all
that lies nearest to the heart of the working man. It is the language of
his hearth and home; many of the most cherished memories of his life
are bound up with it; it is for him the language of freedom, whereas
standard English is that of constraint. In other words, dialect is the
working man's poetic diction--a poetic diction as full of savour as that

of the eighteenth-century poets was flat and insipid.
It is sometimes said that the use of dialect makes the appeal of poetry
provincial instead of national or universal. This is only true when the
dialect poet is a pedant and obscures his meaning by fantastic spellings.
The Lowland Scots element in 'Auld Lang Syne' has not prevented it
from becoming the song of friendship of the Anglo-Saxon race all the
world over. Moreover, the provincial note in poetry or prose is far from
being a bad thing. In the 'Idylls' of Theocritus it gave new life to Greek
poetry in the third century before Christ, and it may render the same
high service to English poetry to-day or to-morow. The rise of
Provincial schools of literature, interpreting local life in local idiom, in
all parts of the British Isles and in the Britain beyond the seas, is a goal
worth striving for; such a literature, so far from impeding the progress
of the literature in the standard tongue, would serve only to enrich it in
spirit, substance and form.
0. 'Yorkshire Dialect Poems', 1673-1915 (Sedgwick and Jackson 1916)
0. 'Reminiscences'
0. J. Dover Wilson, Writing in the 'Athenaeum' under the pseudonym
"Muezzin," February, 1917. The quotation is from one of four
articles, entitled "Prospects in English Literature," to which the
ideas set forth in this Preface owe much.
0. "York Plays": The Building of the Ark.
A Dalesman's Litany
>From Hull, Halifax, and Hell, good Lord deliver us.
A Yorkshire Proverb.
It's hard when fowks can't finnd their wark
Wheer they've bin bred an' born;
When I were young I awlus thowt
I'd bide 'mong t' roots an' corn.
But I've bin forced to work i' towns,
So here's my litany:
Frae Hull, an' Halifax, an' Hell,

Gooid Lord, deliver me!
When I were courtin' Mary Ann,
T' owd squire, he says one day:
"I've got no bield(1) for wedded
fowks;
Choose, wilt ta wed or stay?"
I couldn't gie up t' lass I loved,
To t' town we had to flee:
Frae Hull, an' Halifax, an' Hell,
Gooid Lord, deliver me!
I've wrowt i' Leeds an' Huthersfel',
An' addled(2) honest brass;
I' Bradforth, Keighley, Rotherham,
I've kept my barns an' lass.
I've travelled all three Ridin's round,
And once I went to sea:
Frae forges, mills, an' coalin' boats,
Gooid Lord, deliver me!
I've walked at neet through Sheffield loans,(3)
'T were same as bein' i' Hell:
Furnaces thrast out tongues o' fire,
An' roared like t' wind on t' fell.
I've sammed up coals i' Barnsley pits,
Wi' muck up to my knee:
Frae Sheffield, Barnsley, Rotherham,
Gooid Lord, deliver me!
I've seen grey fog creep ower Leeds Brig
As thick as bastile(4) soup;
I've lived wheer fowks were stowed away
Like rabbits in a coop.
I've watched snow float down Bradforth Beck

As black as ebiny:
Frae Hunslet, Holbeck, Wibsey Slack,
Gooid Lord, deliver me!
But now, when all wer childer's fligged,(5)
To t' coontry we've coom back.
There's fotty mile o' heathery moor
Twix' us an' t' coal-pit slack.
And when I sit ower t' fire at neet,
I laugh an' shout wi' glee:
Frae Bradforth, Leeds, an Huthersfel',

Frae Hull, an' Halifax, an' Hell,
T' gooid Lord's delivered me!
0. Shelter. 2. Earned,
0. Lanes 4. Workhouse 5. Fledged
Cambodunum
Cambodunum is the name of a Roman station, situated on a farm at
Slack, on the hills above Huddersfield.
Cambodunum, Cambodunum,
how I love the sound o' t' name!
Roman sowdiers belt a fort here,
gave th' owd place its lastin' fame.
We've bin lords o' Cambodunum
for well-nigh eight hunderd yeer;
Fowk say our fore-elders
bowt it of a Roman charioteer.
Ay, I know we're nobbut farmers,
mowin' gerse an' tentin' kye,
But we're proud of all we've stood for

i' yon ages that's gone by;
Proud of all the slacks we've drained,
an' proud of all the walls we've belt,
Proud to think we've bred our
childer
on the ground wheer Romans dwelt.
"Niver pairt wi' Cambodunum,"
that's what father used to say;
"If thou does, thou'll coom to ruin,
beg thy breead thro' day