Fire!
By Sir W. S.
I.
St. Giles's street is fair and wide,
St. Giles's street is long;
But long or wide, may naught abide
Therein of guile or wrong;
For through St. Giles's, to and fro,
The mild ecclesiastics go
From prime to evensong.
It were a fearsome task, perdie!
To sin in such good company.
II.
Long had the slanting beam of day
Proclaimed the Thirtieth of May
Ere now, erect, its fiery heat
Illumined all that hallowed street,
And breathing benediction on
Thy serried battlements, St. John,
Suffused at once with equal glow
The cluster'd Archipelago,
The Art Professor's studio
And Mr. Greenwood's shop,
Thy building, Pusey, where below
The stout Salvation soldiers blow
The cornet till they drop;
Thine, Balliol, where we move, and oh!
Thine, Randolph, where we stop.
III.
But what is this that frights the air,
And wakes the curate from his lair
In Pusey's cool retreat,
To leave the feast, to climb the stair,
And scan the startled street?
As when perambulate the young
And call with unrelenting tongue
On home, mamma, and sire;
Or voters shout with strength of lung
For Hall &Co's Entire;
Or Sabbath-breakers scream and shout—
The band of Booth, with drum devout,
Eliza on her Sunday out,
Or Farmer with his choir:—
IV.
E'en so, with shriek of fife and drum
And horrid clang of brass,
The Fire Brigades of England come
And down St. Giles's pass.
Oh grand, methinks, in such array
To spend a Whitsun Holiday
All soaking to the skin!
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poem by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch
Added by Poetry Lover
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