the postillion, observing I was listening⸺Poor Maria , continued he (leaning his body on one side to let me see her, for he was in a line betwixt us), is sitting upon a bank playing her vespers upon her pipe, with her little goat beside her.
The young fellow utter’d this with an accent and a look so perfectly in tune to a feeling heart, that I instantly made a vow, I would give him a four-and-twenty sous piece, when I got to Moulins ⸺
⸻And who is poor Maria? said I.
The love and piety of all the villages around us; said the postillion⸺it is but three years ago, that the sun did not shine upon so fair, so quick-witted and amiable a maid; and better fate did Maria deserve, than to have her Banns forbid, by the intrigues of the curate of the parish who published them⸺
He was going on, when Maria , who had made a short pause, put the pipe to her mouth, and began the air again⸺they were the same notes;⸺yet were ten times sweeter: