Welcome back to the Richmond Read-along! Today we are reading a poem by William Allingham. Born in Ireland, Allingham spent time in various parts of Ireland as a customs investigator before eventually living around England. He was particularly fond of London, not least because it was close to his many illustrious literary friends. His diary remained popular after his death due to these connections. In it, he wrote of his friendships with Tennyson, the Pre-Raphaelites, Leigh Hunt and others. He is also distinguished by his wife, Helen Allingham, who was a prominent Victorian painter and illustrator.

Allingham was enamoured of ballads, and collected English and Scottish ballads and Irish folksongs. He also wrote his own poetry inspired by these collections. Allingham wished to make his living through writing, briefly quitting his job before realising his mistake. It was not until he was 40 that he was able to fully pursue a life of writing, when he was awarded a civil-list pension so that he could continue with his work. The pension was in response to his novel “Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland,” written in verse and discussing Irish politics of the time through the eyes of a landlord.

We are reading “The Fairies:”

“Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren’t go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl’s feather!

Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home,
They live on crispy pancakes
Of yellow tide-foam;
Some in the reeds
Of the black mountain-lake,
With frogs for their watchdogs,
All night awake.

High on the hill-top
The old King sits;
He is now so old and grey
He’s nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill he crosses,
On his stately journeys
From Slieveleague to Rosses;
Or going up with the music
On cold starry nights,
To sup with the Queen
Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget
For seven years long;
When she came down again
Her friends were all gone.
They took her lightly back,
Between the night and morrow,
They thought that she was fast asleep,
But she was dead with sorrow.
They have kept her ever since
Deep within the lake,
On a bed of fig-leaves,
Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hillside,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn trees
For my pleasure, here and there.
Is any man so daring
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren’t go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl’s feather!”

Find this poem at the Scottish Poetry Library. Members of Richmond upon Thames Borough Libraries can read more about Allingham at the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.

Join us tomorrow for the next Richmond Read-along!