Aubrey's version of the words includes fire and fleet, rather than fire and sleet, and this is also how it appears in the Oxford Book of English Verse. F.W. Moorman, in his book on Yorkshire dialect poetry, explains that fleet means floor and references the OED, flet-floor. He also notes that the expression Aboute the fyre upon flet appears in the mediaeval story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and explains that "Fire and fleet and candle-light are a summary of the comforts of the house, which the dead person still enjoys for this ae night, and then goes out into the dark and cold."
Read more about this topic: Lyke-Wake Dirge
Famous quotes containing the words fire and/or fleet:
“Now the appearance of the glory of the LORD was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Exodus 24:17.
“On the middle of that quiet floor
sits a fleet of small black ships,
square-rigged, sails furled, motionless,
their spars like burned matchsticks.”
—Elizabeth Bishop (1911–1979)