For I felt a little angry, and thus said what wasn’t true:
“Hark you, maid, my friend, Joe Simmen, says that all you washerwomen
Are as sour as any lemon, cross as any ole clo’ Jew;
Tell me maiden, is it not so, that you’re like some ole clo’ Jew?”
Quoth the maid “What’s that to you?”
Deep into that countenance peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Lest the girl should prove a vixen, and begin to hit me too;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only words there spoken were the whispered words, “Pooh! pooh!”
These I whispered, for I feared her, whispered just the words, “Pooh! pooh!”