The Dead Drummer: a Legend of Salisbury Plain. 223 



Said he'd only been drunk — 

 That his spirits had sunk 

 At the thunder, — the storm put him into a funk : 



That in fact he had nothing at all on his conscience, 

 And found out, in short, he'd been talking great nonsense. 

 But one Mr. Jones 

 Comes forth and depones, 

 That fifteen years ago he had heard certain groans 

 On his way to Stonehenge to examine the stones, 

 Described in a work of the late Sir John Soane's ; 

 That he'd followed the moans, 

 And, led by their tones, 

 Found a raven a-picking a Drummer-boy's bones. 

 Then the Colonel wrote word 

 From the King's Forty-third 

 That the story was certainly true which they'd heard : 

 For that one of their Drummers and one Sergeant Matcham, 

 Had " brushed with the dibs " and they never could catch' em. 



So Justice was sure, though a long time she lagged, 



And the Sergeant in spite of his " gammon," got scragged ; 



And the people averred 



That an ugly black bird 

 The same raven, t'was hinted, of whom we have heard, 

 Though the story, I own, appears rather absurd, 

 Was seen (Gervase Matcham not being interred) 

 To roost all that night on the murderer's gibbet 

 An odd thing, if so, — and, it may be, a fib. — It 

 However's a thing Nature's laws don't prohibit. 

 Next morning they add, that " black gentleman " flies out 

 Having picked Matcham's nose off, and gobbled his eyes out. 



J. w. 



