And I am come unto the crisis, when
Her fate depends on a kind reader's pardon)--
Wandering forth beyond the ladies' ken,
She thought she spied a male face in the garden--
She hasten'd thither--she was not mistaken,
For sure enough, a man was there a-raking.

A man complete he was who own'd the visage,
A man of thirty-three, or may-be longer--
So young, she could not well distinguish his age--
So old, she knew he had one day been younger.
Now thirty-three, although a very nice age,
Is not so nice as twenty, twenty-one, or
So; but of lovers when a lady's caught one,
She seldom stops to stipulate what sort o' one.

Now, the first moment Hy-son saw the gardener--
A gardener, by his tools and dress she knew--
She felt her bosom round her heart in a--
A--just as if her heart was breaking through;
And so she blush'd, and hoped that he would pardon her
Intruding on his grounds--"so nice they grew!--
Such roses! what a pink!--and then that peony;
Might she die if she ever look'd to see any!"

The gardener offer'd her a budding rose:
She took it with a smile, and colour'd high;
While, as she gave its fragrance to her nose,
He took the opportunity to sigh.
And Hy-son's cheek blush'd like the daylight's close!