Daylight Robbery
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Author: Britney B.
Released 24 August 2003
If you believe the prices charged in local supermarkets are daylight robbery, then spare a thought for 18th century Englishmen and women who were likely to be subjected to the real thing every time they travelled by stagecoach or horse. Highway robbery was a serious threat. The most legendary highwayman was an Essex man, Dick Turpin, who supposedly made a dashing ride from London to York on his faithful mare, Black Bess, in less than 24 hours. However in numerous towns along the A1 motorway (still known as the Great North Road) there are inns where Turpin allegedly spent the night, watered his horse, or ate lunch. If you ever find yourself in one of the many public houses in England called 'The Black Horse', most likely it has been named in honour of Turpin's legendary mount.
Spending a long vacation in the place of my birth and writing articles about my local village, town, and county, reminiscing about my childhood has inevitably brought back memories of schooldays which leads to the reason why I have rather romantic notions of highwaymen. One of my proudest moments at school was my time in the verse speaking choir when we won the Stratford Festival Verse Speaking Competition. The poem we won with has always been my favourite, one that I can still (almost) recite verse for verse. Imagine 25 or so of us excited and nervous children on the Stratford Festival stage in front of a packed audience, our conductor raising her baton, and the choir beginning with the words “The Highwayman, by Alfred Noyes”. I can even now feel the adrenalin surging every time I read the poem.
The poet, Alfred Noyes was born in Wolverhampton, England, on September 16th, 1880. The family moved to Wales when his father became a teacher in Aberystwyth, and the Welsh coast and mountains were an early inspiration. Educated at Exeter College, Oxford, he distinguished himself at rowing, but failed to take his degree as he was visiting his publisher at the time to arrange publication of his first volume of poems. After further successful volumes of poetry and a biography of William Morris were published, Noyes's popularity increased both in Britain and the United States. From 1914 to 1923 he was Professor of Modern English Literature at Princeton University, though in 1916 he returned to Britain for military service, on attachment to the Foreign Office, where he worked with John Buchan on propaganda. He was made a C.B.E. (Commander of the British Empire) in 1918. Much of the period of the Second World War was spent in Canada and the United States. He returned to Britain in 1949, suffering from increasing blindness, and his subsequent works were all dictated. Noyes's autobiography Two World's for Memory, describing his life on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, was published in 1953. He died on 25 June 1958 and was buried in the Roman Catholic cemetery at Freshwater, Isle of Wight.
And for those romantics among you, here is the wonderful poem that Alfred Noyes wrote, one of his most famous. I hope you enjoy it.
The Highwayman, by Alfred Noyes
The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight, over the purple moor,
And a highwayman came riding
Riding-riding-
A highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door
He'd a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,
A coat of claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe skin
They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to the thigh,
And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,
His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky
Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn yard,
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred,
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love knot into her long black hair.
And dark in the old inn yard a stable wicket creaked,
Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked,
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,
But he loved the landlord's daughter,
The landlord's red lipped daughter,
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say –
"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light,
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."
He rose upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair o'er the casement. His face burnt like a brand,
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast,
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
(Oh, sweet black waves in the moonlight)
Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the West.
He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon,
But out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,
When the road was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor,
A red coat troop came marching,
Marching, marching-
King George's men came marching, up to the old inn-door.
They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead,
But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed,
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side
There was death at every window,
And hell at one dark window
For Bess could see through the casement, the road that he would ride.
They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest,
They bound a musket beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast,
"Now keep good watch" and they kissed her.
She heard the dead man say,
Look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way.
She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held good,
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood,
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,
Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,
Cold, on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one figure touched it. The trigger at last was hers.
The tip of one finger touched it; she strove no more for the rest
Up, she stood to attention, with the barrel beneath her breast,
She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again,
For the road lay bare in the moonlight,
Blank and bare in the moonlight’
And the blood of her veins in the moonlight throbbed to her love's refrain.
Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence. Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night,
Nearer he came and nearer. Her face was like a light,
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
The musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him with her death.
Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high
Blood-red were his spurs in the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat
When they shot him down on the highway,
Down like a dog on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with a bunch of lace at his throat.
And still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
A highwayman comes riding,
Riding, riding,
A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.
Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn yard,
And he taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there,
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.
Just in case you were terrible impressed that our school choir won the Stratford Verse Speaking competition, let me just mention it was in Stratford, East London, and not Stratford-Upon-Avon, the home of the Bard!