PHOEBE. Sir, sir!
VALENTINE. No skulker, ma'am, I hope, but gradually turning into a grumpy, crusty, bottle-nosed old bachelor.
PHOEBE. Oh, Mr. Brown!
VALENTINE. And all because you will not walk across the street with me.
PHOEBE. Indeed, sir, you must marry—and I hope it may be some one who is really like a garden.
VALENTINE. I know but one. That reminds me, Miss Phoebe, of something I had forgot. (He produces a paper from his pocket.) 'Tis a trifle I have wrote about you. But I fear to trouble you.
(PHOEBE'S hands go out longingly for it.)
PHOEBE (reading). 'Lines to a Certain Lady, who is Modestly unaware of her Resemblance to a Garden. Wrote by her servant, V. B.'
(The beauty of this makes her falter. She looks up.)
VALENTINE (with a poet's pride). There is more of it, ma'am.