“Shame on thee, thou perfidious mulberry! A devil’s tree! A Friday-planted tree! Blight seize and wood-louse eat thee! May thy master Hold thee in horror for this day’s disaster! Tell me thou art not hurt, Mirèio!” Trembling from head to foot, she answered, “No: “I am not hurt; but as a baby weeps And knows not why,--there’s something here that keeps Perpetual tumult in my heart. A pain Blinds me and deafens me, and fills my brain, So that my blood in a tumultuous riot Courses my body through, and won’t be quiet.” “May it not be,” the simple boy replied, “Thou fearest to have thy mother come and chide Thy tardy picking,--as when I come back Late from the blackberry-field with face all black, And tattered clothes?” Mirèio sighed again, “Ah, no! This is another kind of pain!” “Or possibly a sun-stroke may have lighted Upon thee!” And the eager Vincen cited An ancient crone among the hills of Baux, Taven by name, “who on the forehead,--so,-- A glass of water sets: the ray malign The dazed brain for the crystal will resign.” “Nay, nay!” impetuously the maiden cried, “Floods of May sunshine never terrified The girls of Crau. Why should I hold you waiting? Vincen, in vain my heart is palpitating! My secret cannot bide a home so small: I love you, Vincen, love you!--That is all!” The river-banks, the close-pruned willows hoary, Green grass and ambient air, hearing this story, Were full of glee. But the poor basket-weaver, “Princess, that thou who art so fair and clever, Shouldst have a tongue given to wicked lying! Why, it confounds me! It is stupefying! “What! thou in love with me? Mirèio, My poor life is yet happy. Do not go And make a jest thereof! I might believe Just for one moment, and thereafter grieve My soul to death. Ah, no! my pretty maid, Laugh no more at me in this wise!” he said. “Now may God shut me out of Paradise, Vincen, if I have ever told you lies! Go to! I love you! Will that kill you, friend? But if you _will_ be cruel, and so send Me from your side, ’tis I who will fall ill, And at your feet lie low till sorrow kill!” “No more! no more!” cried Vincen, desperately: “There is a gulf ’twixt thee and me! The stately Queen of the Lotus Farm art thou, and all Bow at thy coming, hasten to thy call, While I, a vagrant weaver, only wander, Plying my trade from Valabrègo yonder.” “What care I?” cried the fiery girl at once. Sharp as a sheaf-binder’s came her response. “May not my lover, then, a baron be, Or eke a weaver, if he pleases me? But if you will not have me pine away, Why look so handsome, even in rags, I say?”