Читать книгу Charles Peace, or The Adventures of a Notorious Burglar онлайн

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“Nay; I must be for getting home,” answered the girl, “an’ leave you men folks to yourselves.”

She was about to depart, but as Peace had commenced a preliminary flourish on his violin, she sat down again.

The violinist played a fantasia, introducing a number of popular airs which seemed to delight his audience amazingly.

When he brought this part of his performance to a close he was encored.

He then imitated the noises of animals in the farm-yard; this sent the rustics into perfect ecstacies of delight.

“They had never heard anything so perfectly natural in their born days”—​so they one and all declared.

“Well, thee just does know how to handle the fiddle,” said one.

“And mek it speak like a Christian,” said another.

“It be a gift,” observed another.

Nell now rose to go, but she was not permitted to do so, until she had favoured the company with a song. In a rich contralto voice she sang the following:—

I love the shepherd’s artless rhymes,

A shepherd’s joys revealing;

I love the songs of ancient times,