“And can you sing, Martha, as well as laugh? Sing now, sing about this rose,” here he took the little blossom from her bosom.
“Give me the rose.”
“Nay, thou wilt let me keep it.”
“Give me the rose, I say.”
“But—but.”
“Nay, master, if you will keep it, keep it.”
And—she sang. The Lady Henrietta was beginning to enjoy the comedy. There was a deal of unlooked-for happiness about it, somehow.
It was at the end of this song, the honest chronicler states, that Lionel went down on his knees before the new servant, and in plain straightforward terms told her he loved her. This may appear a highly rapid mode of courtship, but reference to middle age authorities—and the authorities of Elizabeth may surely be called middle aged—will thoroughly set at rest this question in the mind of any sceptical reader, if I have to deplore such a one. I do not know the authorities by name, but that has nothing whatever to do with it.
The lady smiling a little as the impromptu lover tore away all question of inferiority of rank on her part; this latter, as see the authorities again, was for suicide and sudden death, but the perky Nancy coming into the room, followed by Plunket, the young farmer Lionel only got up off his knees.
The new servant, Nancy, it seemed, had drawn a mug of beer, but forgotten to turn the tap off, hence flight on her part and pursuit on the part of farmer Plunket, who, chasing his prey up into a sharp corner, caught a crashing box on her saucy ears.