Well grounded by a village tutor In languages alive and past, He'd say unto himself, "Knee-suitor, Oh, do not go beyond your last!" But though his name could boast no handle, He could not every hope resign; As moths will hover round a candle, So hovered he about her shrine. The brilliant candle dazed the moth well: One day she sang to her Papa The air that MARIE sings with BOTHWELL In NIEDERMEYER'S opera. (Therein a stable boy, it's stated, Devoutly loved a noble dame, Who ardently reciprocated His rather injudicious flame.) And then, before the piano closing (He listened coyly at the door), She sang a song of her composing-- I give one verse from half a score: BALLAD _Why, pretty page, art ever sighing? Is sorrow in thy heartlet lying? Come, set a-ringing Thy laugh entrancing, And ever singing And ever dancing. Ever singing, Tra! la! la! Ever dancing, Tra! la! la! Ever singing, ever dancing, Ever singing, Tra! la! la!_ He skipped for joy like little muttons, He danced like Esmeralda's kid. (She did not mean a boy in buttons, Although he fancied that she did.) Poor lad! convinced he thus would win her, He wore out many pairs of soles; He danced when taking down the dinner-- He danced when bringing up the coals. He danced and sang (however laden) With his incessant "Tra! la! la!" Which much surprised the noble maiden, And puzzled even her Papa. He nourished now his flame and fanned it, He even danced at work below. The upper servants wouldn't stand it, And BOWLES the butler told him so. [Illustration] At length on impulse acting blindly, His love he laid completely bare; The gentle Earl received him kindly And told the lad to take a chair. "Oh, sir," the suitor uttered sadly, "Don't give your indignation vent; I fear you think I'm acting madly, Perhaps you think me insolent?" The kindly Earl repelled the notion; His noble bosom heaved a sigh, His fingers trembled with emotion, A tear stood in his mild blue eye: For, oh! the scene recalled too plainly The half-forgotten time when he, A boy of nine, had worshipped vainly A governess of forty-three! "My boy," he said, in tone consoling, "Give up this idle fancy--do-- The song you heard my daughter trolling Did not, indeed, refer to you. "I feel for you, poor boy, acutely; I would not wish to give you pain; Your pangs I estimate minutely,-- I, too, have loved, and loved in vain. [Illustration] "But still your humble rank and station For MINNIE surely are not meet"-- He said much more in conversation Which it were needless to repeat.