Explore "The Rolling English Road" by G.K. Chesterton on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode, / The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road. / A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire, / And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire; / A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread / The night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head.
I knew no harm of Bonaparte and plenty of the Squire, / And for to fight the Frenchman I did not much desire; / But I did bash their baggonets because they came arrayed / To straighten out the crooked road an English drunkard made, / Where you and I went down the lane with ale-mugs in our hands, / The night we went to Glastonbury by way of Goodwin Sands.