And when we had gone in again, and candles had been lit in his fresh and narrow chamber, seeing a viol upon a chest, I begged a little music.

He quite eagerly, with a boyish peal of laughter, complied; and sat down with a very solemn face, his brows uplifted, and sang between the candles to a pathetic air this doggerel:—­

    There’s a dark tree and a sad tree,
    Where sweet Alice waits, unheeded,
    For her lover long-time absent,
    Plucking rushes by the river.

    Let the bird sing, let the buck sport,
    Let the sun sink to his setting;
    Not one star that stands in darkness
    Shines upon her absent lover.

    But his stone lies ’neath the dark tree,
    Cold to bosom, deaf to weeping;
    And ’tis gathering moss she touches,
    Where the locks lay of her lover.

“A dolesome thing,” he said; “but my mother was wont to sing it to the virginals.  ‘Cold to bosom,’” he reiterated with a plangent cadence; “I remember them all, sir; from the cradle I had a gift for music.”  And then, with an ample flirt of his bow, he broke, all beams and smiles, into this ingenuous ditty: 

        The goodman said,
        “’Tis time for bed,
    Come, mistress, get us quick to pray;
        Call in the maids
        From out the glades
      Where they with lovers stray,
      With love, and love do stray.”

        “Nay, master mine,
        The night is fine,
    And time’s enough all dark to pray;
        ’Tis April buds
        Bedeck the woods
      Where simple maids away
      With love, and love do stray.

        “Now we are old,
        And nigh the mould,
    ’Tis meet on feeble knees to pray;
        When once we’d roam,
        ’Twas else cried, ’Come,
      And sigh the dusk away,
      With love, and love to stray.’”

        So they gat in
        To pray till nine;
    Then called, “Come maids, true maids, away! 
        Kiss and begone,
        Ha’ done, ha’ done,
      Until another day
      With love, and love to stray!”

        Oh, it were best
        If so to rest
    Went man and maid in peace away! 
        The throes a heart
        May make to smart
      Unless love have his way,
      In April woods to stray!—­

      In April woods to stray!

And that finished with another burst of laughter, he set very adroitly to the mimicry of beasts and birds upon his frets.  Never have I seen a face so consummately the action’s.  His every fibre answered to the call; his eyebrows twitched like an orator’s; his very nose was plastic.

“Hst!” he cried softly; “hither struts chanticleer!” “Cock-a-diddle-doo!” crowed the wire.  “Now, prithee, Dame Partlett!” and down bustled a hen from an egg like cinnamon.  A cat with kittens mewed along the string, anxious and tender.