He stood with the other young herds
At the Hiring to-day:
And I laughed and I chaffed and changed words
With every young hind of them all
As I stopped by the lollipop stall,
But never a word did he say.

He had straggly long straw-coloured hair
And a beard like a goat—
In his breeches a badly-stitched tear
That I longed, standing there in the crush,
To re-mend, as I hankered to brush
The ruddle and fluff from his coat.

But his bonnie blue eyes staring wide
Looked far beyond me,
As though on some distant fellside
His dogs were collecting the sheep,
And he anxiously watched them to keep
A young dog from running too free—

And I almost expected to hear
From the lips of the lad
A shrill whistle sing in my ear,
As he eyed that green hillside, to check
The fussy black frolicking speck
From chasing the grey specks like mad. . . .

So I left them and went on my way
With a lad with black hair;
And we swung and rode round all the day
To the racket of corncrake and gong;
But I never forgot in the throng
The lad with the far-away stare.

The jimmy-smart groom at my side
Had twinkling black eyes;
But the grin on his mouth was too wide,
And his hands with my hands were too free;
So I took care to slip him at tea
As he turned round to pay for the pies:

And I left him alone on the seat
With the teapot and cups,
And the two pies he'd paid for to eat.
If he happens to think of the cause,
It may teach him to keep his red paws
For the handling of horses and pups.

But alone in the rain and the dark,
As I made for the farm,
I halted a moment to hark
To the sound of a shepherd's long stride,
And the shy lad stepped up to my side
And I felt his arm link through my arm.

So it seems after all I'm to mend
Those breeches, and keep
That shaggy head clipped to the end,
And the shaggy chin clean, and to give
That coat a good brush—and to live
All my days in the odour of sheep.