gleans + 1xlagniappe at 9:40 PM MT, 07/05

Millions hungry as warming shifts seasons - Oxfam

Reuters - Frank Nyakairu, Megan Rowling - ‎"Drought is now happening on a yearly basis, and there is increased hunger and starvation because of declining food stocks, as we see here in Karamoja," ...

 

The curious incident of the straight-A student with Asperger's syndrome

 

Stately Passions: The Scandals of Britain's Great Houses by Jamie Douglas-Home (Hardcover - Sep 28, 2007)  17 Used & new from $18.50   (2)

 

It was a magnificent run. From the end of WWII to the 1960s, California emerged as America’s dominant

political, social, and cultural trendsetter... more»

 

 

lagniappe

Wassail Chorus at the Mermaid Tavern

By Theodore Watts-Dunton

1836-1914

---

CHRISTMAS knows a merry, merry place,
         Where he goes with fondest face,
         Brightest eye, brightest hair:
Tell the Mermaid where is that one place,
         Where?

Raleigh. 'Tis by Devon's glorious halls,
         Whence, dear Ben, I come again:
Bright of golden roofs and walls--
         El Dorado's rare domain--

         Seem those halls when sunlight launches
         Shafts of gold thro' leafless branches,
Where the winter's feathery mantle blanches
         Field and farm and lane.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Drayton. 'Tis where Avon's wood-sprites weave
         Through the boughs a lace of rime,
         While the bells of Christmas Eve
         Fling for Will the Stratford-chime
         O'er the river-flags emboss'd
         Rich with flowery runes of frost--
O'er the meads where snowy tufts are toss'd--
         Strains of olden time.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Shakespeare's Friend. 'Tis, methinks, on any ground
         Where our Shakespeare's feet are set.
         There smiles Christmas, holly-crown'd
         With his blithest coronet:
         Friendship's face he loveth well:
         'Tis a countenance whose spell
Sheds a balm o'er every mead and dell
         Where we used to fret.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Heywood. More than all the pictures, Ben,
         Winter weaves by wood or stream,
Christmas loves our London, when
         Rise thy clouds of wassail-steam--
         Clouds like these, that, curling, take
         Forms of faces gone, and wake
Many a lay from lips we loved, and make
         London like a dream.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Ben Jonson. Love's old songs shall never die,
         Yet the new shall suffer proof:
         Love's old drink of Yule brew I
         Wassail for new love's behoof.
         Drink the drink I brew, and sing
         Till the berried branches swing,
Till our song make all the Mermaid ring--
         Yea, from rush to roof.

FINALE. Christmas loves this merry, merry place;
         Christmas saith with fondest face,
         Brightest eye, brightest hair:
'Ben, the drink tastes rare of sack and mace:
         Rare!'