I say, love! replied I. Come, said
she, don't let the wench see you have been crying, nor tell her any
tales: for you won't tell them fairly, I am sure: and I'll send her, and
you shall take another walk in the garden, if you will: May be it will
get you a stomach to your dinner: for you don't eat enough to keep life
and soul together. You are beauty to the bone, added the strange wretch,
or you could not look so well as you do, with so little stomach, so
little rest, and so much pining and whining for nothing at all. Well,
thought I, say what thou wilt, so I can be rid of thy bad tongue and
company: and I hope to find some opportunity now to come at my sunflower.
But I walked the other way, to take that in my return, to avoid
suspicion.
I forced my discourse to the maid; but it was all upon general things;
for I find she is asked after every thing I say and do. When I came near
the place, as I had been devising, I said, Pray step to the gardener, and
ask him to gather a sallad for me to dinner. She called out, Jacob! said
I, He can't hear you so far off; and pray tell him, I should like a
cucumber too, if he has one. When she had stept about a bow-shot from
me, I popt down, and whipt my fingers under the upper tile, and pulled
out a letter without direction, and thrust it in my bosom, trembling for
joy.
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