it from his
hand. Man, go away immediately!"

Martin Pippin propped his elbows on the little gate, and looked smiling
into the orchard, all pink and white blossom. The trees that had been
longest in bloom were white cascades of flower, others there were
flushed like the cheek of a sleeping child, and some were still studded
with rose-red buds. The grass was high and full of spotted orchis, and
tall wild parsley spread its nets of lace almost abreast of the lowest
boughs of blossom. So that the milkmaids stood embraced in meeting
flowers, waist-deep in the orchard growth: all gowned in pink lawn with
loose white sleeves, and their faces flushed it may have been with the
pink linings to their white bonnets, or with the evening rose in the
west, or with I know not what.

"Go away!" they cried at the intruder. "Go away!"

"My rose-white maidens," said Martin, "will you not let me into your
orchard? For the stars are rising with the dew, and the hour is at
peace. Let me in to rest, dear maidens--if maidens indeed you be, and
not six blossoms fallen from the apple-boughs."

"You cannot come in," said Joscelyn, "lest you are the bearer of a word
to our master's daughter who sits weeping in the Well-House."

"From whom should I bear her a word?" asked Martin Pippin in great
amazement.

The milkmaids cast down their eyes, and little Joan said, "It is a
secret."

Martin: I will inquire no further. But shall I not play a little on my
lute? It is as good an hour for song and dance as any other, and I will
make a tune for a sunny May evening, and you shall sway among the
grasses like any flower on the bough.

Jane: In my opinion that can hurt nobody.

Jessica: Gillian wouldn't care two pins.

Joyce: She would utter no word though we tripped it for a week.

Joscelyn: So long as he keeps to his side of the hedge--

Jennifer: --and we to ours.

"Oh, I do love to dance!" cried little Joan.

"Man!" they commanded him as one voice, "play and sing to us instantly!"

"My pretty ones," laughed Martin Pippin, "songs are as light as air,
but worth more than pearls and diamonds. What will you give me for my
song? Wait, now!--I have it. You shall fetch me the ring from the
finger of your little mistress, who sits hidden beneath the fountain of
her own bright tresses."

The milkmaids at these words nodded gayly, and little Joan tip-toed to
the Well-House, and slipped the ring from Gillian's finger as lightly
as a daisy may b