The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

WOODSTOCK. 217
"You never brought me word what o'clock it was this morning," replied
the young lady, "and there I sate questioning of the wings of Time, when
I should have remembered that gentlemen's gallantry'can be quite as fugitive as Time himself. How do you know what your disobedience may have
cost me and others? Pudding and pasty may have been burned to a cinder,
for, sir, I practise the old domestic rule of visiting the kitchen; or I may
have missed prayers, or I may have been too late for an appointment,
simply by the negligence of Master Louis Kerneguy failing to let me know
the hour of the day."
" 0," replied Kerneguy, "I am one of those lovers who cannot endure
absence-I must be eternally at the feet of my fair enemy —such, I think,
is the title with which romances teach us to grace the fair and cruel to
whom we devote our hearts and lives.-Speak for me, good lute," he added,
taking up the instrument, " and show whether I know not my duty."
He sung, but with more taste than execution, the air of a French rondelai,
to which some of the wits or sonnetteers, in his gay and roving train, had
adapted English verses.
An hour with thee!- When earliest day One hour with thee!-When burning June
Dapples with gold the eastern grey, Waves his red flag at pitch of noon;
Oh, what can frame my mind to bear What shall repay the faithful swain,
The toil and turmoil, cark and care, His labour on the sultry plain,
New griefs, which comning hours unfold, And more than cave or sheltering hbough,
And sad remembrance of the old?- Cool feverish blood, and throbbing brow?One hour with thee! One hour with thee!
One hour with thee! -When sun is set,
0, what can teach me to forget
The thankless labours of the day;
The hopes, the wishes, flung away:
The increasing wants, and lessening gains,
The master's pride, who scorns my pains?One hour with thee!
"Truly, there is another verse," said the songster; " but I sing it not to
you, Mistress Alice, because some of the prudes of the court liked it not."
"I thank you, Master Louis," answered the young lady, "both for your
discretion in singing what has given me pleasure, and in forbearing what
might offend me. Though a country girl, I pretend to be so far of the court
mode, as to receive nothing which does not pass current among the better
class there."
" I would," answered Louis, "that you were so well confirmed in their
creed, as to let all pass with you, to which court ladies would give currency."
"And what would be the consequence?" said Alice, with perfect composure.
" In that case," said Louis, embarrassed like a general who finds that his
preparations for attack do not seem to strike either fear or confusion into
the enemy - " in that case you would forgive me, fair Alice, if I spoke to
you in a warmer language than that of mere gallantry -if I told you how
much my heart was interested in what you consider as idle jesting - if I
seriously owned it was in your power to make me the happiest or the most
miserable of human beings."
" Master Kerneguy," said Alice, with the same unshaken nonchalance,
"let us understand each other. I am little acquainted with high-bred manners, and I am unwilling, I tell you plainly, to be accounted a silly country
girl, who, either from ignorance or conceit, is startled at every word of
gallantry addressed to her by a young man, who, for the present, has nothing
better to do than coin and circulate such false compliments. But I must
not let this fear of seeming rustic and awkwardly timorous carry me too
far; and being ignorant of the exact limits, I will take care to stop within
them."
"I trust, madam," said Kerneguy, "that however severely you may be
disposed to judge of me, your justice will not punish me too severely for an
offence, of which your charms are alone the occasion?"
"Hear me out, sir, if you please," resumed Alice. "I have listened to
T