My father once sang me a song whose words were written by Rudyard Kipling. He knew Kipling as a boy (perhaps even learned the song from him) and gave me the impression that Kipling would rather have had his words sung or recited than just read from the printed page. I'm not surprised, then, that so many musicians over the years have set his words to music (most notable recently: Peter Bellamy), as his verses so often seem to be shouting a tune in your ear as you read them. We sing a slightly shortened version, distinctly Americanized, from the original which my stepmother, Stormy, so kindly ferreted out of her collection for me. This is what she found. Kipling was born in Bombay, 1865, and died in 1936. (GB)
There dwells a wife by the northern gate,
And a wealthy wife is she.
She breeds a breed o' rovin' men
And sends them over sea.
And some are drowned in deep water
And some in sight o' shore,
And word goes back to the weary wife
And ever she sends more.
Fo· r since that wife had gate and gear
And hearth and garth and bield*, [shelter]
She's willed her sons to the white harvest
And that is a bitter yield.
She's willed her sons to the wet plowing,
To ride the horse of tree,
And syne her sons come back again,
Far spent from out the sea.
Rich are they in wonders seen,
But poor in the goods o' men,
For what they ha' got for the skin of
their teeth
They sell for their teeth again.
(*The version I saw said field, as we sing it)
For whether they lose to the naked skin*
Or win to their heart's desire,
They tell it all to the weary wife
That nods beside the fire.
Her hearth is wide to every wind
That makes the white ash spin,
And tide and tide and 'tween the tides,
Her sons go out and in.
Out with great mirth that do desire
Hazard of trackless ways;
In with content to wait their watch
And warm before the blaze.
And some return by failing light
And some in waking dream,
For she hears the heels of the dripping
ghosts
That ride the rough roof beam.
Home they come from all the ports,
The living and the dead;
The good wife's sons come home again
For her blessings on their head.
(*the version I saw said "knife")