"Oh, do you see, now, how her gentle birth shines through her lowly condition!" she said, quickly. "And when the old shepherd finds that he has been ordering a king's daughter to be the mistress of the feast--ay, and soundly rating her, too, for her bashful ways--what a fright will seize the good old man! And what says she in answer?--again, good Prue--let me hear it again--marry, now, I'll be sworn she had just such another voice as yours!"
"To the King Polixenes," Prudence continued, regarding the manuscript, "who is in disguise, you know, Judith, she says:
'Welcome, sir! It is my father's will I should take on me The hostess-ship o' the day:--you're welcome, sir.'
'Give me those flowers there, Dorcas.--Reverend sirs, For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep Seeming and savor all the winter long: Grace and remembrance be to you both, And welcome to our shearing!'"
"Ah, there, now, will they not be won by her gentleness?" she cried, eagerly. "Will they not suspect and discover the truth? It were a new thing for a prince to wed a shepherdess, but this is no shepherdess, as an owl might see! What say they then, Prue? Have they no suspicion?"
So Prudence continued her patient reading--in the intense silence that was broken only by the twittering of the birds in the orchard, or the crowing of a cock in some neighboring yard; and Judith listened keenly, drinking in every varying phrase. But when Florizel had addressed his speech to the pretty hostess of the day, Judith could no longer forbear: she clapped her hands in delight.
"There, now, that is a true lover; that is spoken like a true lover," she cried, with her face radiant and proud. "Again, good Prue--let us hear what he says--ay, and before them all, too, I warrant me he is not ashamed of her."
So Prudence had to read once more Florizel's praise of his gentle mistress:
"'What you do Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet, I'd have you do it ever: when you sing, I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms; Pray so; and, for the ordering your affairs, To sing them too. When you do dance, I wish you A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do Nothing but that; move still, still so, and own No other function. Each your doing, So singular in each particular, Crowns what you are doing in the present deeds, That all your acts are queens!'"
