Page:Mistral - Mirèio. A Provençal poem.djvu/90

64 XIX. "Fold thine arms tighly, then: Clasp the oak only! I 'll a white sister be! Far off in St. Blasi, Secure and lonely!"

XX. "Be thou a white-veiled nun Come to confession, I will be there as priest, Thee freely to divest Of all transgression!"

The startled women their cocoons let fall. "Noro, make haste!" outspake they one and all: "What could our hunted Magali answer then? A nun, poor dear, who had already been A cloud, a bird, a fish, an oak, a flower, The sun, the moon, the stream, in one short hour?"

"Ah, yes!" said Noro, "I the rest will sing: She was, I think, the cloister entering; And that mad fowler dared to promise her He would in the confessional appear, And shrive her. Therefore hear what she replies: The maid hath yet another last device:"—