ROSE.

(VIELLE CHANSON DU JEUNE TEMPS.)

(AFTER VICTOR HUGO.)

I never thought at all of Rose,
As Rose and I went through the dell,
We fell a talking I suppose,
But yet of what I cannot tell.

Pebbles below and mosses over,
Rippled a cool and limpid rill;
Nature lay sleeping like a lover
In the embrace of the woods so still.

Shoes and stockings off she slipped,
And with her sweetly innocent air
Into the stream her feet she dipped,
Yet I never saw her feet were bare.

I only talked, the time beguiling
As we wandered, she and I;
And sometimes I saw her smiling,
But now and then I heard her sigh.

Only her beauty dawned on me
When silent woods were left behind,