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'My true love hath my heart and I have his, By just exchange, one for the other given. I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss; There never was a better bargain driven. His heart in me keeps me and him in one, My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides; He loves my heart, for once it was his own, I cherish his, because in me it bides.' |
The sound of these words by Sir Philip Sidney, sung in a sweet melodious voice, was borne upon the summer air of a fair June evening in the year 1590.
It came through the open casement from the raised seat of the parlour at Hillbrow, where once Mistress Ratcliffe had sat at her spinning-wheel, casting her watchful eyes from time to time upon the square of turf lying between the house and the entrance gate, lest any of her maidens should be gossiping instead of working.
Mistress Ratcliffe had spun her last thread of flax more than a year ago, and another mistress reigned in her place in the old house upon the crest of the hill above Penshurst.
As the last words of the song were sung, and only the lingering chords of the viol were heard, making a low, sweet refrain, a man who had been listening unseen to the music under the porch, with its heavy overhanging shield of carved stone, now came to the open window, which, though raised some feet above the terrace walk beneath, was not so high but that his head appeared on a level with the wide ledge of the casement.
Lucy was unconscious of his presence till he said,—
'I would fain hear that song again, Lucy.'
'Nay,' she said with a smile; 'once is enough.'
'Did you think of me as you sang?' he asked.
'Perhaps,' she said, with something of her old spirit. 'Perhaps; but you must know there is another who hath my heart. I have been singing him to sleep, and I pray you do not come in with a heavy tramp of your big boots and wake him. He has been fractious to-day. Speak softly,' she said, as George exclaimed,—