Weep no more, lady; lady, weep no more,
Thy sorrow is in vain;
For violets pluck’d, the sweetest showers
Will ne’er make grow again.
A merry, clear laugh followed, and a turn in the path showed her Guy, Amy, and Charlotte, busy over a sturdy stock of eglantine. Guy, little changed in these two years,—not much taller, and more agile than robust,—was lopping vigorously with his great pruning-knife, Amabel nursing a bundle of drooping rose branches, Charlotte, her bonnet in a garland of wild sweet-brier, holding the matting and continually getting entangled in the long thorny wreaths.
‘And here comes the “friar of orders gray,” to tell you so,’ exclaimed Guy, as Mary, in her gray dress, came on them.
‘Oh, that is right, dear good friar,’ cried Amy.
‘We are so busy,’ said Charlotte; ‘Guy has made Mr. Markham send all these choice buds from Redclyffe.’
‘Not from the park,’ said Guy, ‘we don’t deal much in gardening; but Markham is a great florist, and these are his bounties.’
‘And are you cutting that beautiful wild rose to pieces?’
‘Is it not a pity?’ said Amy. ‘We have used up all the stocks in the garden, and this is to be transplanted in the autumn.’
‘She has been consoling it all the time by telling it it is for its good,’ said Guy; ‘cutting off wild shoots, and putting in better things.’
‘I never said anything so pretty; and, after all, I don’t know that the grand roses will be equal to these purple shoots and blushing buds with long whiskers.’