d Sweeter Woman Ne’er Drew Breath

thing when you like. I’ll not make or meddle with it.”

Janet betook herself to the kitchen and Eric went to look for Kilmeny. She was not in the orchard and it was not until he had searched for some time that he found her. She was standing under a beech tree in a field beyond the orchard, leaning on the longer fence, with her hands clasped against her cheek. In them she held a white Mary-lily from the orchard. She did not run to meet him while he was crossing the pasture, as she would once have done. She waited motionless until he was close to her. Eric began, half laughingly, half tenderly, to quote some lines from her namesake ballad:

“ ‘ Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been? Long hae we sought baith holt and den,— By linn, by ford, and greenwood tree!

‘ Yet you are halesome and fair to see. Where got you that joup o’ the lily sheen? That bonny snood o’ the birk sae green, And those roses, the fairest that ever was seen? Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been?’

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