Page:Maud, and other poems.djvu/127

Rh If James were coming. "Coming every day," She answer'd, "ever longing to explain, But evermore her father came across With some long-winded tale, and broke him short; And James departed vext with him and her." How could I help her? "Would I—was it wrong?" (Claspt hands and that petitionary grace Of sweet seventeen subdued me ere she spoke) "O would I take her father for one hour, For one half-hour, and let him talk to me!" And even while she spoke, I saw where James Made toward us, like a wader in the surf, Beyond the brook, waist-deep in meadow-sweet.

'O Katie, what I suffer' d for your sake! For in I went, and call'd old Philip out To show the farm: full willingly he rose: He led me thro' the short sweet-smelling lanes Of his wheat-suburb, babbling as he went.