'Twos on a night, with sleet and snow,
From out the north a tempest blew,
When Thistle gathered nerve to go
The little Nettle's self to woo.

Within her father's cottage soon
He found the ever-dreaded maid;
She then was knitting to a tune
The wind upon the window played.

His errand known, she, with a frown,
Up from the oaken table sprung,
Down took the broom and swept the room,
While like a bell her clapper rung.

'Have I not seen enough to be
Convinced for ever, soon or late,
The maid shall rue the moment she
Attendeth to a wooer's prate?

'How long ago since Phemie Hay
To Harry at the Mill fell wrong?
How long since Hall a prank did play
On silly Nelly Brown?-how long?

'How ago long ago since Adam Smith
Wooed Annie on the Moor, and left
The lassie with a stain? yea, with
A heart of every hope bereft?

'But what need instance cases? lo!
Have I not heard thee chaunt the lay,
'The fraud of men was ever so
Since summer first was leafy?' eh?

'When men are to be trusted, then,
-But never may that time befall;
Of five times five-and-twenty men,
There's barely five are men at all.

'Before the timid maid they'll fall,
And smile and weep and sigh and sue,
Till once they get her in their thrall,
And then she's doomed her lot to rue.

'For her a subtle snare they weave,
And when the bonny bird is caught,
Then, then they giggle in their sleeve;
Then laugh to scorn the ill they've wrought.

'As other weary winds, they woo
The bloom its treasures to unfold;
Extract its wealth-their way pursue,
And leave her pining on the wold.

'When poppies fell like lilies smell,
When cherries grow on brambles, when-
When grapes adorn the common thorn,
Then women may have faith in men.

'Then may we hear what they may swear;
Till then, sir, know I'm on my guard,
And he, the loon that brings me down,
He, he'll be pardoned, on my word.'

Thus for an hour her tongue was heard;
By this, her words grown faint and few,
She raised the broom at every word,
And thumped the floor to prove it true.

In ardent words the youth replied:-
'Dread hollow-hearted guile thou must;
But deem not all of honour void,
Nor punish all with thy mistrust.

'A few, not all, the lash have earn'd,
Let but that few the lash assail;
The world were topsy-turvy turned,
Did not some sense of right prevail.

'Destroy the weed, but spare the flower;
Consume the chaff, but keep the grain;
Nor harry one who'd die before
He'd give thy little finger pain.'

On hearing this, she sat her down,
Took up her needlework again,
And tho' she strove to wear a frown,
Made answer in a milder strain.

'Forego thy quest. Deceitful words
May yet, as they have been, may be,
A fatal lure to lighter birds;
They'll never prove the like to me.

'Still by my chastity I vow,
As I have kept the cheat at bay,
So, should I keep my senses, so
I'll keep him till my dying day.

'The best that man can do or say,
The love of gold or rubies rare,-
Not all that wealth can furnish, may
Once lure to leave me in a snare.

'So end thy quest.' He only prest
His ardent suit the more, while she
At every word he uttered, garr'd
Her fleeing needles faster flee.

'My quest by honour's justified
I long have eyed and found thee still
The maid I'd like to be my bride;
Would I could say the maid that will.

'Hadst thou but been a daffodil
That with the breezes sport and play,
For all thy suitor valued, still
Thou so hadst danced thy life away.

'But thou so fair art chaste.' Thus he
Unto her answer answers e'er,
And that too in a way that she
Must will or nill his answer hear.

And then a chair he'd taken, his chair
Unto her side he nearer drew;
Recurred to memories sweet and rare,
And in a softer key did woo.

'Must all the passion which I've sought
So long to hide be paid with scorn?
A heart with pure affection fraught
Be doomed a hopeless love to mourn?

'And must thou still its homage spurn?
And must thou still my suit reject?
And be to me this cruel thorn?
Reflect upon the past, reflect!

'A time there was, and time shall pass
To me ere that forgotten be,
When side by side from tide to tide
We played and sported on the lea.

'Ay, then have I not chased the bee
From bloom to bloom-oft chased and
caught,
And having drawn its sting in glee,
To thee the little body brought?

'Then when a bloom of rarer dyes
Into my busy fingers fell,
To whom was reached the lucky prize?
Can not thy recollection tell?

'As oft away as summer went,
Who pulled with thee the haw, bright,
brown-
Brown as thy own bright eyes-and bent
For thee the richest branches down?

'With blooms I've graced thy yellow hair,
With berries filled thy lap, thy hand,-
That hand as alabaster fair-
Had every gift at my command.

'Nay, tho' to others dour, yet meek
I ever was to thee, and kind,
And when we played at hide-and-seek,
I hid where thou would'st seek to find

'Upon the play-ground still unmatched
Was I, unless my loved one played:
And then it seem'd to those who watched,
My failures were on purpose made.

'As sure as e'er a race began,
The palm was mine unless she joined,
And then I always was out-ran,
For still with her I lagged behind.

'The ball I drove to others, mocked
Their efforts to arrest its flight;
But when my ball to her was knocked,
It would upon her lap alight.

'None, up and down so well I bobbed,
To skip the rope with me would try;
Did she attempt? my skill was robbed;
Another skipped her out-not I.

'At play thus wasn't; but childhood past,
And e'er the lasses reach their teens,
Atween them and the lads a vast
Mysterious distance intervenes.

'They seldom on the green appear
In careless sport and play; and if
They join the throng erect they wear
Their head, and still their air is stiff-

'They ail they know not what. And such
The change that on my lassie fell
Then would she shrink my hand to touch,
And I half feared her touch as well.

'Had I changed too? This, I can tell,-
That touch o'er me a spell would cast;
And did I pass her in the dell,
With slow and snail-like pace I pass'd.

'Her voice had lost its former ring,
Yet, in that voice such power was flung,
I better liked to hear her sing,
Than when of old to me she sung.

'Her touch, her tone, would make or mar
My bliss, and tho' with all my skill
I strove to please, and please but her,
I in her presence blundered still.

'When by the hearth she sewing sat,
Did I to thread her needle try?
Still, still my heart played pit-a-pat,
And still I miss'd the needle's eye.

'As with the needle-threading, so
We with the skein a-winding fared,
And Auntie's dreaded tongue would go
Before the dancing end appeared.

''What ails the lass?' she often said-
'She's sound asleep!' once said, and flew,
And snatched and snapt the tangled thread,
While I-I know not how-withdrew.

'Away, too, fled those hours! Alack!
They came and went like visions rare,
To mock the heart, delude and wrack,
And leave the gazer in despair.

'Ah, less-tho' sun-illumed-less fair
The blobs that dance adown the burn,
And let them burst they'll re-appear
Ere those delightsome hours return.

'Yet they may live in thought, and could
They live in Nettle's thought again,
Would she not change her bearing? would-
Would she not change this bitter strain?

'Would she her lover still disdain
Would she continue thus to gall
And put him to this cruel pain?-