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     A Rose of Womanhood 
     
    
   
   
    
       
     
    
   
   
    
     In that case another evening will do. 
     
     And now won’t you give me some flow- 
     
     ers? ” 
     
    

    
     She nodded, with another little smile, 
     
     and began to pick some of the June lilies, 
     
     carefully selecting the most perfect 
     
     among them. He watched her lithe, 
     
     graceful motions with delight; every 
     
     movement seemed poetry itself. She 
     
     looked like a very incarnation of Spring 
     
     —-as if all the shimmer of young leaves 
     
     and glow of young mornings and evanes- 
     
     cent sweetness of young blossoms in a 
     
     thousand springs had been embodied in 
     
     her. 
     
    

    
     When she came to him, radiant, her 
     
     hands full of the lilies, a couplet from 
     
     a favourite poem darted into his head— 
     
    
   
   
    
     ” A blossom vermeil white 
     
     That lightly breaks a faded flower sheath, 
     
     Here, by God’s rood, is the one maid for me.” 
     
    
   
   
    
     The next moment he was angry with 
     
     himself for his folly. She was, after all, 
     
    
   
   
    
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