"A thief, your honour! Didn't I catch him prowling into my garden? And isn't it for him to say what his business was? I put it to your honour"--here she caught the poor wretch another cuff--"what honest business took him into my garden, and me left a widow-woman these sixteen years?" "Ai-ee!" cried the accused, still shielding his neck and cowering in the dust--a thin ragged windlestraw of a youth, flaxen-headed, hatchet-faced, with eyes set like a hare's. "Have pity on me sirs, and take her off!" "Let him stand up," my father commanded. "And you sir, tell me-- What were you seeking in this good woman's garden?" "A rose, sir--hear my defence!--a rose only, a small rose!" His voice was high and cracked, and he flung his hands out extravagantly. "Oh, York and Lancaster--if you will excuse me, gentlemen--that I should suffer this for a mere rose? The day only just begun too! And why, sirs, was I seeking a rose? Ay, there's the rub." He folded his arms dramatically and nodded at the woman. "There's the gall and bitterness, the worm in the fruit, the peculiar irony--if you'll allow me to say so--of this distressing affair. Listen, madam! If I wanted a rose of you, 'twas for your whole sex's sake: your sex's, madam--every one of whom was, up to five or six months ago, the object with me of something very nearly allied to worship." "Lord help the creature!" cried the woman. "What's he telling about? And what have you to do with my sex, young man? which is what the Lord made it." "It is _not_, madam. Make no mistake about it: 'twere blasphemy to think so. But speaking generally, what I--as a man--have to do with your sex is to protect it." "A nice sort of protector you'd make!" she retorted, planting her knuckles on her hips and eyeing him contemptuously. "I am a beginner, madam, and have much to learn. But you shall not discourage me from protecting you, though you deny me the rose which was to have been my emblem. Every woman is a rose, madam, as says the poet Dunbar-- "'Sweet rose of vertew and of gentilness, Richest in bonty and in bewty clear And every vertew that is werrit dear, Except only that ye are merciless--" "You take me? 'Merciless,' madam?" "I don't understand a word," said she, puzzled and angry. "He was a Scotsman: and you find it a far cry to Loch Awe. Well, well--to resume-- "'Into your garth this day I did pursue--'" "by 'garth' meaning 'garden': a good word, and why the devil it should be obsolescent is more than I can tell you--" But here my father cut him short. "My good Mrs. Ede," said he, turning to the woman, "I believe this young man intended no harm to you and very little to your garden. You are quits with him at any rate. Take this shilling, step inside, and choose him a fair red rose for the price and also in token of your forgiveness, while he picks up his hat which is lying yonder in the dust."