And loud he sung against the sunny sheen,--
'O Maye with all thy flowers and thy green,
Right welcome be thou, faire, freshe, Maye!
I hope that I some green here getten may!"

Smiling at the antique simplicity and freshness of the lines as they
rang across his brain like the musical jingle of an old-world
spinet, his ears suddenly caught the sound of young voices singing
at a distance.

"Here come the children!" he said; and stepping out from his open
window into the garden, he again bent his ear to listen. The
tremulous voices came nearer and nearer, and words could now be
distinguished, breaking through the primitive quavering melody of
'The Mayers' Song' known to all the country side since the
thirteenth century:

"Remember us poor Mayers all.--
And thus do we begin,
To lead our lives in righteousness,
Or else we die in sin.

We have been rambling all this night,
And almost all this day,
And now returning back again,
We bring you in the May.

The hedges and trees they are so green,
In the sunne's goodly heat,
Our Heavenly Father He watered them