"blush"

[szaroczek]

Well, what can I say; again "Young Goodman Brown" ... (But there is a good news too! - only one and a half of page left!!! ) :

"This night it shall be granted you to know their secret deeds; how hoary-bearded elders of the church have whispered wanton words to the young maids of their households; how many a woman, eager for widow's weeds, has given her husband a drink at bed-time, and let him sleep his last sleep in her bosom; how beardless youths have made haste to inherit their fathers' wealth; and how fair damsels - blush not, sweet ones! - have dug little graves in the garden, and bidden me, the sole guest, to an infant's funeral"

Phew! Longer quotation but this is only to bring more context... Now, two questions :

1. Does "blush not" here mean: "They (fair damsels) didn't even blush when doing those terrible things"?

2. "Sweet ones" - This is an exclamation of admiration, appreciation and love of the speaker (which is probably devil), isn't it?

3. "bidden" - in the above case would be an equivalent to "offer" or to "force" (since "bid" possesses those two separate meanings (with apparently different forms of "simple past" and "past participle")?

[SoothingDave]

1. To whom is he speaking? It seems to me he is interrupting his speech to address his audience. Perhaps some of those damsels are in the audience at the time? It is a command, or an exhortation.

2. He is addressing the comment to the audience (or some in the audience) with a term of affection.

3. It means something like "command."

[szaroczek]

Man, this is SO obvious to me now!!! Of course he is addressing the AUDIENCE - not those "fair damsels" (of which some might surely have been indeed present there)! How could I NOT have seen it before? And thus, of course, "sweet ones" - they are the "AUDIENCE" as well! Man, this is wrong, this is so, so wrong... I think I'm going to quit those English study...

Thank you also for the 3.-rd one - me too think it's more like "command".