One day, as the light was falling low
And the turbulent wind was still,
In a stony hollow,
Where none dared follow,
Beyond the ridge on the gorse-clad summit, the summit of Winter Hill!
The news went round in the camp that night;
it was Dickon who brought it first
How the wonderful dragon,
The fiery dragon,
On his terrified eyes had burst.
"I was out," he said, "for a fat young buck,
But never a touch I had of luck;
And still I wandered and wandered on
Till all the best of the day was gone;
When, suddenly, lo, in a flash of flame
Full over the ridge a green head came,
A green head flapped with a snarling lip,
And a long tongue set with an arrow's tip.
I own I didn't stand long at bay,
But I cast my arrows and bow away,
And I cast my coat, and I changed my plan,
And forgot the buck, and away I ran--
And, oh, but my heart was chill:
For still as I ran I heard the bellow
Of the terrible slaughtering fierce-eyed fellow
Who has made his lair on the gorse-clad summit,
the summit of Winter Hill."
Then the women talked, as the women will, and the men-folk they talked too
Of the raging dragon,
The hungry dragon,
The dragon of green and blue.
And the Bards with their long beards flowing down,
They sat apart and were seen to frown.
But at last the Chief Bard up and spoke,
"Now I swear by beech and I swear by oak,
By the grass and the streams I swear," said he,
"This dragon of Dickon's puzzles me.
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