He’s a gay and gallant rover,
And I ’spect he’s false to me.”
The particular weeping willow from which this garland was to be gathered was one of the most pliant and flexible in Rubicon Meadows, and it needed to be so; for many years it had been used as a rocking-horse by the slender, graceful girl swinging on one of its drooping branches.
Up and down she went, seated comfortably on one of the lower limbs. The time was seven o’clock in the morning, the season early July,—the period of greatest greenness, freshness, and delicacy in the New England summer.
The girl was putting in the hour that must elapse before her parents should see fit to descend from their chamber and partake of breakfast; and while she swung, her gaze wandered far out over the meadows toward the distant village twinkling and sparkling in the early morning sun.
It was one of the loveliest spots in New Hampshire, but the river and the meadows and the village were an old story to the swinging girl. At present her thoughts were far from her home and her immediate surroundings; and, closing her eyes, she sang more vivaciously than ever:
“‘He’s a gay and gallant rover,
And I ’spect he’s false to me.’”
“No, he isn’t,” said a voice, so deep and so sudden that she almost lost her balance, and her hazel eyes flew open with unwonted rapidity.
“Ah!” she said, drawing a long breath, and clinging closer to her shaggy green steed.