"Take all you wish for, soldiers!
Take wealth and goods away;
But spare my precious baby
The food it wants to-day!

"You have driv'n away my husband
From his children and his wife;
From his Church and from his parish,
And he leads a wanderer's life.

"So I am now divided
From the husband whom I love;
And my children have no father,
But Him Who is above.

"Take all you want, and welcome;
But only leave behind
That vessel for my baby,
And I will call you kind."

Their hearts were hard as millstones,
And they would not hear her prayer;
And they flung away the vessel,
And they left her in despair.

But God was with His servant
In the hour of her distress;
And He comforted the widow,
And preserved the fatherless.

This was the way Dissenters
Used to serve true Churchmen then;
And perhaps, if they were able,
They might do the same again.

Project Canterbury