Sometimes she wandered out to gather sticks, For it was bitter cold there when it snowed. And she stole hay out of the farmer’s ricks For bands to wrap her feet in while she sewed, And when her feet were warm and the grate glowed She hugged her little son, her heart’s desire, With ’Jimmy, ain’t it snug beside the fire?’
So years went on till Jimmy was a lad And went to work as poor lads have to do, And then the widow’s loving heart was glad To know that all the pains she had gone through And all the years of putting on the screw, Down to the sharpest turn a mortal can, Had borne their fruit, and made her child a man.
He got a job at working on the line Tipping the earth down, trolly after truck, From daylight till the evening, wet or fine, With arms all red from wallowing in the muck, And spitting, as the trolly tipped, for luck, And singing ’Binger’ as he swung the pick Because the red blood ran in him so quick.
So there was bacon then, at night, for supper In Bye Street there, where he and mother stay; And boots they had, not leaky in the upper, And room rent ready on the settling day; And beer for poor old mother, worn and grey, And fire in frost; and in the widow’s eyes It seemed the Lord had made earth paradise.
And there they sat of evenings after dark Singing their song of ’Binger,’ he and she, Her poor old cackle made the mongrels bark And ’You sing Binger, mother,’ carols he; ’By crimes, but that’s a good song, that her be’: And then they slept there in the room they shared, And all the time fate had his end prepared.
One thing alone made life not perfect sweet: The mother’s daily fear of what would come When woman and her lovely boy should meet, When the new wife would break up the old home. Fear of that unborn evil struck her dumb, And when her darling and a woman met, She shook and prayed, ’Not her, O God; not yet.’
’Not yet, dear God, my Jimmy go from me.’ Then she would subtly question with her son. ’Not very handsome, I don’t think her be?’ ’God help the man who marries such an one.’ Her red eyes peered to spy the mischief done. She took great care to keep the girls away, And all her trouble made him easier prey.
There was a woman out at Plaister’s End, Light of her body, fifty to the pound, A copper coin for any man to spend, Lovely to look on when the wits were drowned. Her husband’s skeleton was never found, It lay among the rocks at Glydyr Mor Where he drank poison finding her a whore.