I bade him drink another draught of the wine, having no interest to scrape acquaintance with his Muse; but he was not so easily to be put off.
"It begins thus," said he, and tossing back his long and tawny hair from his eyes, lifted his right hand aloft and beat the air with his fingers as he proceeded—
"Fresh Spring, the lovely herald of great Love,
On whose green tabard are the quarterings
Of many flowers below and trees above
In proper colours, as befits such things—
Go to my love——"
"Hold, hold!" I cried, "methinks I have read something very similar to these lines of yours in another man's verses."
He held his hand still suspended, though his eyes flashed in disdain of my commentary.
"An' you were not young and my benefactor," he said, with an extreme bitterness, "I would be tempted to clap you into a filthy ballad."
"Do you use to write your ballads, full?" I inquired, "seeing 'tis apparently your custom to steal your lyricks, empty."
He brought down his raised hand clenched upon the other.
"I steal nothing from any man," he cried in a great voice; but even as he spoke his face went white, and his eyes rolled in his head. I thought he had fallen into some fit of poetics, and offered him the wine again, but he cautioned me to be silent, at the same time cringing backward into the shadows.
"Why, what ails you?" I asked encouragingly.