The Hag is astride,
This night for to ride;
The Devill and shee together:
Through thick, and through thin,
Now out, and then in,
Though ne’r so foule be the weather.
A Thorn or a Burr
She takes for a Spurre:
With a lash of a Bramble she rides now,
Through Brakes and through Bryars,
O’re Ditches, and Mires,
She followes the Spirit that guides now.
No Beast, for his food,
Dares now range the wood;
But husht in his laire he lies lurking:
While mischiefs, by these,
On Land and on Seas,
At noone of Night are working,
The storme will arise,
And trouble the skies;
This night, and more for the wonder,
The ghost from the Tomb
Affrighted shall come,
Cal’d out by the clap of the Thunder.
Credits
Robert Herrick was a 17th-century English lyric poet, best known for his collection Hesperides (1648), which gathered over 1,400 poems ranging from delicate love verses to vivid folk superstition. "The Hag" reflects Herrick's deep interest in rural English witchlore and the darker rituals of country life that ran alongside his more celebrated celebrations of beauty and nature.