“I am no troubadour,” sighed the brown youth; “I know one tale only, and that is over long for a summer day.”
But the child was angered; his eyes flashed, and he clenched one hand and flung it backward, menacing:—
“I 'll believe thou mockest me,” he cried. “Lying tongue! No poet thou, but a lazy hind.”
Then the gray, smouldering eyes of the dreamer shot fire, and a long brown arm jerked the lad to his knees.
“I tell no lies. My lady is Saint Truth,” the dreamer said. “Poet or no poet, as thou wilt, I 'll not gainsay thee. But a truthteller ever.”
A little lamb that strayed near by looked up with startled face, and scampered down the hill, crying “Ba-a-a!” The huntsman's note came winding up from the green depths. The child arose and dusted his knees.
“There be poets that yet lie amazingly,—and boast thereof,” he observed shrewdly; “but now I rede thy riddle of Saint Truth. 'T is a sweet jest. I love thee for it, and by that I know thee for a poet. Tell me thy tale, and we 'll be friends again. Of a surety thou art no hind; Prince Lionel's self is not more haughty of mien than thou. Sing then, poet,—smile!”
The dreamer cleared his brow but half unwillingly: “Who could not choose but smile on such a teasing lad?” he asked; and then, "My tale is but begun, and what the end shall be, or whether there be an end,—who shall say? Hearken!
"In a summer season when soft was the sun,
I set me in a shepherd's coat as I a shepherd were;
In the habit of a hermit, yet unholy of works,
Wandered I wide in this world wonders to hear.
But in a May morning on Malvern Hills
There befel me a wonder, wonderful methought it;
I was weary of wandering and went me to rest
Under a broad bank by a burn side,
And as I lay and leaned and looked on the waters,
I slumbered in a sleep"—
“No, no! not thus, not thus!” cried out the child on a sudden; “never thus! An thou come to court they 'll not hearken thy long slow measures. Thou shalt make thy verses the French way, with rhyme. Needs must thou learn this manner of the French ere thou come to court.”