“’How shall I woo her?  I will stand
    Beside her when she sings,
  And watch her fine and fairy hand
    Flit o’er the quivering strings! 
  But shall I tell her I have heard,
    Though sweet her song may be,
  A voice where every whispered word
    Was more than song to me?

  “’How shall I woo her?  I will gaze,
    In sad and silent trance,
  On those blue eyes whose liquid rays
    Look love in every glance. 
  But shall I tell her eyes more bright,
    Though bright her own may beam,
  Will fling a deeper spell to-night
  Upon me in my dream?’”

I hesitated.  “Let me stop here, Major Favraud, I counsel you,” I interpolated, earnestly; but he only rejoined: 

“No, no! proceed, I entreat you! it is very beautiful—­very touching, too!” Speaking calmly, and slacking rein, so that the grating of the wheels among the stems of the scarlet lychnis, that grew in immense patches on our road, might not disturb his sense of hearing, which, by-the-way, was exquisitely nice and fastidious.

“As you please, then;” and I continued the recitation.

  “’How shall I woo her?  I will try
    The charms of olden time,
  And swear by earth, and sea, and sky,
    And rave in prose and rhyme—­
  And I will tell her, when I bent
    My knee in other years,
  I was not half so eloquent;
    I could not speak—­for tears!’”

I watched him narrowly; the spell was working now; the poet’s hand was sweeping, with a gust of power, that harp of a thousand strings, the wondrous human heart!  And I again pursued, in suppressed tones of heart-felt emotion, the pathetic strain that he had evoked with an idea of its frivolity alone: 

  “’How shall I woo her?  I will bow
    Before the holy shrine,
  And pray the prayer, and vow the vow,
    And press her lips to mine—­
  And I will tell her, when she starts
    From passion’s thrilling kiss,
  That memory to many hearts
    Is dearer far than bliss!’”

It was reserved for the concluding verse to unnerve him completely; a verse which I rendered with all the pathos of which I was capable, with a view to its final effect, I confess: 

  “’Away! away! the chords are mute,
    The bond is rent in twain;
  You cannot wake the silent lute,
    Or clasp its links again. 
  Love’s toil, I know, is little cost;
    Love’s perjury is light sin;
  But souls that lose what I have lost,
    What have they left to win?’”

“What, indeed?” he exclaimed, impetuously—­tears now streaming over his olive cheeks.  He flung the reins to me with a quick, convulsive motion, and covered his face with his hands.  Groans burst from his murmuring lips, and the great deeps of sorrow gave up their secrets.  I was sorry to have so stirred him to the depths by any act or words of mine, and yet I enjoyed the certainty of his anguish.