Here Jack and Tom are paired with Moll and Meg. <br />Curved open to the river-reach is seen <br />A country merry-making on the green. <br />Fair space for signal shakings of the leg. <br />That little screwy fiddler from his booth, <br />Whence flows one nut-brown stream, commands the joints <br />Of all who caper here at various points. <br />I have known rustic revels in my youth: <br />The May-fly pleasures of a mind at ease. <br />An early goddess was a county lass: <br />A charmed Amphion-oak she tripped the grass. <br />What life was that I lived? The life of these? <br />Heaven keep them happy! Nature they seem near. <br />They must, I think, be wiser than I am; <br />They have the secret of the bull and lamb. <br />'Tis true that when we trace its source, 'tis beer.<br /><br />George Meredith<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/modern-love-xviii-here-jack-and-tom/
