What will ye, my poor orphans, do, <br />When I must leave the world and you; <br />Who'll give ye then a sheltering shed, <br />Or credit ye, when I am dead? <br />Who'll let ye by their fire sit, <br />Although ye have a stock of wit, <br />Already coin'd to pay for it? <br />--I cannot tell: unless there be <br />Some race of old humanity <br />Left, of the large heart and long hand, <br />Alive, as noble Westmorland; <br />Or gallant Newark; which brave two <br />May fost'ring fathers be to you. <br />If not, expect to be no less <br />Ill used, than babes left fatherless.<br /><br />Robert Herrick<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-his-verses/
