Whereupon the girl replies:
"Je ris de moi, je ris de toi,
De nos fortes entreprises:
C'est d'avoir passé le bois
Sans un petit mot me dire!"
The maiden is going away from the lover, who is too bashful to speak the little word. She is supposed to be waving her hand in the distance. Then the lover is aroused.
"Revenez, belle! Revenez, belle!
Je vous donnerai cent livres!"
But the girl does n't want his fortune. She has had a glimpse of a larger world.
"Ni pour un cent, ni pour deux cent,
Ni pour cinq cent mille livres:
Il fallait mangé la perdrix
Tandis qu'elle était prise!"
And the pretty little partridge will never come back. The girl, still going, cries:—
"La perdrix a pris sa volée,
Elle se mit en ville;
Je vois mes amants promener
Dans le pare de la ville!"
All through the singing Joi Billette kept his eyes on Euphrasie, and he thought she was singing at him. The motions of her pretty head, the glances of her bright eyes,—in every way she seemed to be saying that
