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: this is how I remember it.. : The Ballad of D@ck Turpin : By Alfred Noyes : The day light moon looked quietly down, : Through the gathering dusk on London town. : A smock frocked yokel hobbled along, : By Newgate humming a country song. : Chewing a straw he stood to stare, : At the proclamation posted there. : Two hundred guineas on Turpins head, : Trap him alive or shoot him dead, : And a hundred more for his mate Tom King. : He crouched like a tiger about spring, : Then he looked up and he looked down, : And chuckling low like a country clown, : D@ck Turpin painfully hobbled away, : In search of his inn the Load of Hay. : Alone in her stall his mare Black Bess, : Lifted her head in mute distress, : For five strange men had entered the yard, : And looked at her long and looked at her hard. : They went out muttering under their breath, : And then the dusk grew still as death. : But the velvet ears of the listening mare, : Lifted and twitched, they were there still there. : Hidden in waiting for whom and why, : The clock struck four, a step drew nigh. : It was King, Tom King, D@ck Turpin's mate, : The black mare whinneyed too late, too late. : They rose like shadows out of the ground, : Grappled him there without a sound. : "Throttle him quietly, choke him dead, : Or we lose the hawk for a jay" they said. : They wrestled and heaved, five men against one, : And a yokel entered the yard alone. : A smock frocked yokel hobbling slow, : But a fight is physical as all men know. : His age dropped off, he stood upright, : He lept like a tiger into the fight. : Hand to hand they fought in the dark, : For none could fire at a twisting mark. : For he that shot at a foe may send, : His pistol ball threw the skull of a friend. : "But shoot D@ck shoot" gasped out Tom King, : "shoot or damn it we both shall swing. Shoot and chance it". : D@ck leapt back, he drew, he fired. : At the pistol's crack the wrestlers whirled, they scattered apart, : And the bullet drilled through Tom King's heart. : D@ck Turpin dropped his smoking gun, they had trapped him now five men to one. : A gun in each hand of the crouching five, they could take him now, dead or alive. : Take him and bind him and tell their tale, : As a pothouse boast when they drank their ale. : He whistled, soft as a bird might call, : A headrope snapped in his bird's dark stall. : He whistled soft as a knightingale : he heard the swish of her swinging tale. : There was no way out that the five could see, : To Heaven or hell but the Tyburn tree. : No door but death, and yet, once more, : He whistled as though at a sweetheart's door. : The five men laughed at him trapped alive, : And the door crashed open behind the five. : Out of her stable, a wave of thunder, : Swept Black Bess and the five went under. : He leapt to the saddle, a hoof spurned stone flashed blue fire....and their prize was gone.

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