Last night! Why, all this tintamarre was but a dream, Fanfare of fairy trumpets while we slept. A night it was for love-in-idleness, And fragrant thoughts and airy phantasy! There was no moon, but Venus shone as bright; The honeysuckle blew its tiny horn To tell the rose a moth was coming by. _Clarice-Marie!_ sang all the nightingales, Or would have sung were nightingales abroad! _Hush, hush!_ the little waves kept whispering. The ivy at your window still was peeping; You lay in dreams, that gold curl on your breast! THE MARQUISE No, no! You cheat me not, monsieur! Last night I did not sleep! DE VARDES Nor I! THE MARQUISE Miserable brigands! DE VARDES No, not brigands! Just wretched flesh and blood. THE MARQUISE You pity them? DE VARDES Ay. THE MARQUISE Were I a seigneur, Lord of Morbec— DE VARDES Were I a poor fisher, Sailing at sunrise home from the islands, Over the sea, and all my heart singing! And you were a herd girl slender and sweet, With the gold of your hair beneath your cap, And you kept the cows and you were my _douce_, And you waved your hand from the green cliff head When the sun and I came up from the sea!— And there was a seigneur so great and grim Who walked in his garden and said aloud, “How many fish has he taken for me? Which of her cows shall I keep for myself? I leave him enough to pay for the Mass The day he is drowned, and the girl shall have The range of the hills for her one poor cow! Why should the fisher fret, the herd girl weep? There is no reason in a serf’s dull heart! I might have taken all. It is my right!” La belle Marquise, what would the herd girl do? And should the fisher suffer and say naught? THE MARQUISE There is no fisher nor no herd girl here. How fair the roses of Morbec, monsieur! DE VARDES Ay, they are lovely queens. They know it too! I better like the heartsease at your feet. THE MARQUISE It is a peasant flower!—Sieur de Morbec, Have you never loved? DE VARDES How fair is the day! For loving how fit! ‘Tis the Eve of Saint John. THE MARQUISE Yes. DE VARDES Last year I loved on this very day. Take the omen, madame! THE MARQUISE We had not met, You and I! DE VARDES