Blessed is the wooing That is not long a-doing.

How often in the summer-tide, His graver business set aside, His stripling Will, the thoughtful-eyed As to the pipe of Pan, Stepped blithesomely with lover's pride Across the fields to Anne.

Thrice happy's the wooing that's not long adoing. So much time is saved in the billing and cooing.

Meanwhile "Black sheep, black sheep!" we cry, Safe in the inner fold; And maybe they hear, and wonder why, And marvel, out in the cold.

From their folded mates they wander far, Their ways seem harsh and wild: They follow the beck of a baleful star, Their paths are dream-beguiled.

We are the doubles of those whose way Was festal with fruits and flowers; Body and brain we were sound as they, But the prizes were not ours.