There he pulled in his pole and lay groaning in the punt, letting it drift, while he called her his beloved and a little devil.

Suddenly he took me from his pocket, kissed me, and cast me down from him into the night.

I fell among reeds, head downward; and there I lay all through the cold, horrid night.

The gray morning came at last, then the sun, and a boat now and again.

I thought I had found my grave, when I saw his punt coming toward the reeds.