Warned

They stood at the garden gate.          By the lifting of a lid     She might have read her fate          In a little thing he did.     He plucked a beautiful flower;          Tore it away from its place     On the side of the blooming bower;          And held it against his face.     Drank in its beauty and bloom,          In the midst of his idle talk;     Then cast it down to the gloom          And dust of the garden walk.     Ay, trod it under his foot,          As it lay in his pathway there;     Then spurned it away with his boot,          Because it bad ceased to be fair.     Ah! the maiden might have read          The doom of her young life then;     But she looked in his eyes instead,          And thought him the king of men.     She looked in his eyes and blushed,          She hid in his strong arms' fold;     And the tale of the flower, crushed          And spurned, was once more told.