"Do you know that?" asked Miss Falkland; "or that! or that?"
"No, indeed," answered Colonel Manners; "but I know the air of this one, and have sung it more than once to different words, the composition of a lady possessing no small poetical powers. I will try to recollect them now; though, to speak the truth, it is doing some injustice to the lines to take them from the drama for which they were designed, and apply them to an old song."
"Oh, never mind; we will make all due allowances," replied Miss Falkland; "am I to accompany you, or Marian!--Oh, very well, with all my heart! Is it to be the time of a monody or a jig?"
"Not too fast, if you please," replied Colonel Manners; and Miss Falkland accompanying him, he sang the following lines to an air, which was then not very new, but which is now in all probability lost to posterity.
"I woo thee not as others woo, I flatter not as others do, Nor vow that I adore; I cannot laugh, I cannot smile. Nor use, as they, each courtly wile, But oh, I love thee more.
"The rich, the noble, and the great, Offer thee wealth, and power, and state, And fortunes running o'er! How can I smile, when none of these Give me the worldly power to please, Though I may love thee more?
"And yet I hope, because I love With thoughts that set thee far above Vain Fortune's glittering store. Others may deem thou canst be won By things that sparkle in the sun, But oh, I love thee more.
"I do believe that unto thee Truth, honour, plain sincerity, Are jewels far before All that the others think are dear; And yet far more than they I fear, Because I love thee more.
"I love thee more than all the train Who flaunt, who flatter, and who feign, And vow that they adore: I love thee as men loved of yore-- Ah, no, I love thee more--far more Than man e'er loved before."
"I do not think I could have resisted those verses well sung," cried Isadore, smiling as he concluded, if I had been the most disdainful beauty that ever carried a hawk upon her glove in the days of old. "What do you say, Marian?"
"I do not know how far my powers of resistance might go," answered Marian de Vaux, "but I should very much like to hear the rest of the story. You say that it is in a drama, Colonel Manners, I think; pray, can it be procured?"