“I am far from my country alone,
And my friends and my parents so true.
From the land of my birth I have flown,
And the faces around me are new!
I weep and I sigh all the day,
And dream of fair Italy’s shore;
How can I be lightsome and gay,
When perchance I shall see it no more?”
“Well, I never!” exclaimed the woman in the black silk bonnet, “pore thing! I always did say as I hated them furrin’ countries, but I suppose them as is born in them is used to them.”
“Waft me, ye winds, to my home,
Where my light skiff bounds on the wave;
My heart is too weary to roam,
And its rest is the wanderer’s grave!”
Here the exile turned her eyes upwards and sat thunderously down, a pocket-handkerchief at her face.
“’Tis a bad case, pore lady,” said the farmer’s wife again.
“That ain’t no loidy,” remarked Howlie shortly.
“Hold yer tongue, ye varmint,” said the farmer’s wife.
For once in his life Howlie was nonplussed; chance had thrown him against one of the few people fitted to deal with him.