“A Poem by E.D.” was the next thing on the list. Esther Dearborn rose with great pomp and dignity, cleared her throat, put on a pair of eye- glasses, and began.
MISS JANE
Who ran to catch me on the spot,
If I the slightest rule forgot,
Believing and excusing not?
Miss Jane.
Who lurked outside my door all day
In hopes that I would disobey,
And some low whispered word would say?
Miss Jane.
Who caught our Rose-bud half way through
The wall which parted her from two
Friends, and that small prank made her rue?
Miss Jane.
Who is our bane, our foe, our fear?
Who’s always certain to appear
Just when we do not think her near?
Miss Jane.
—“Who down the hall is creeping now
With stealthy step, but knowing not how
Exactly to discover”—
broke in Rose, improvising rapidly. Next moment came a knock at the door. It was Miss Jane.
“Your drawers, Miss Carr,—your cupboard,”—she said, going across the room and examining each in turn. There was no fault to be found with either, so she withdrew, giving the laughing girls a suspicious glance, and remarking that it was a bad habit to sit on beds,—it always injured them.
“Do you suppose she heard?” whispered Mary Silver.
“No, I don’t think she did,” replied Rose. “Of course she suspected us of being in some mischief or other,—she always does that. Now, Mary, it’s you turn to give us an intellectual treat. Begin.”
Poor Mary shrank back, blushing and protesting.
“You know I can’t,” she said, “I’m too stupid.”
“Rubbish!” cried Rose, “You’re the dearest girl that ever was.” She gave Mary’s shoulder a reassuring pat.
“Mary is excused this time,” put in Katy. “It is the first meeting, so I shall be indulgent. But, after this, every member will be expected to contribute something for each meeting. I mean to be very strict.”
“Oh, I never, never can!” cried Mary. Rose was down on her at once. “Nonsense! hush!” she said. “Of course you can. You shall, if I have to write it for you myself!”
“Order!” said the President, rapping on the table with a pencil.
“Rose has something to read us.”
Rose stood up with great gravity. “I would ask for a moment’s delay, that the Society may get out its pocket-handkerchiefs,” she said. “My piece is an affecting one. I didn’t mean it, but it came so. We cannot always be cheerful.” Here she heaved a sigh, which set the S. S. U. C. to laughing, and began.
A SCOTCH POEM
Wee, crimson-tippet Willie Wink,
Wae’s me, drear, dree, and dra,
A waeful thocht, a fearsome flea,
A wuther wind, and a’.
Sair, sair thy mither sabs her lane,
Her een, her mou, are wat;
Her cauld kail hae the corbies ta’en,
And grievously she grat.
Ah, me, the suthering of the wind!
Ah, me, the waesom mither!
Ah, me the bairnies left ahind,
The shither, hither, blither!
“What does it mean?” cried the girls, as Rose folded up the paper and sat down.
“Mean?” said Rose, “I’m sure I don’t know. It’s Scotch, I tell you! It’s the kind of thing that people read, and then they say, ‘One of the loveliest gems that Burns ever wrote!’ I thought I’d see if I couldn’t do one too. Anybody can, I find: it’s not at all difficult.”
All the poems having been read, Katy now proposed that they should play “Word and Question.” She and Clover were accustomed to the game at home, but to some of the others it was quite new.
Each girl was furnished with a slip of paper and a pencil, and was told to write a word at the top of the paper, fold it over, and pass it to her next left-hand neighbor.
“Dear me! I don’t know what to write,” said Mary Silver.
“Oh, write any thing,” said Clover. So Mary obediently wrote “Any thing,” and folded it over.
“What next?” asked Alice Gibbons.
“Now a question,” said Katy. “Write it under the word, and fold over again. No, Amy, not on the fold. Don’t you see, if you do, the writing will be on the wrong side of the paper when we come to read?”
The questions were more troublesome than the words, and the girls sat frowning and biting their pencil-tops for some minutes before all were done. As the slips were handed in, Katy dropped them into the lid of her work-basket, and thoroughly mixed and stirred them up.
“Now,” she said, passing it about, “each draw one, read, and write a rhyme in which the word is introduced and the question answered. It needn’t be more than two lines, unless you like. Here, Rose, it’s your turn first.”
“Oh, what a hard game!” cried some of the girls; but pretty soon they grew interested, and began to work over their verses.
“I should uncommonly like to know who wrote this abominable word,” said Rose, in a tone of despair. “Clover, you rascal, I believe it was you.”
Clover peeped over her shoulder, nodded, and laughed.
“Very well then!” snatching up Clover’s slip, and putting her own in its place, “you can just write on it yourself,—I shan’t! I never heard of such a word in my life! You made it up for the occasion, you know you did!”
“I didn’t! it’s in the Bible,” replied Clover, setting to work composedly on the fresh paper. But when Rose opened Clover’s slip she groaned again.
“It’s just as bad as the other!” she cried. “Do change back again,
Clovy,—that’s a dear.”
“No, indeed!” said Clover, guarding her paper: “you’ve changed once, and now you must keep what you have.”
Rose made a face, chewed her pencil awhile, and then began to write rapidly. For some minutes not a word was spoken.
“I’ve done!” said Esther Dearborn at last, flinging her paper into the basket-lid.
“So have I!” said Katy.
One by one the papers were collected and jumbled into a heap. Then
Katy, giving all a final shake, drew out one, opened it, and read.
WORD.—Radishes.
QUESTION.—How do you like your clergymen done?
How do I like them done? Well, that depends.
I like them done on sleepy, drowsy Sundays;
I like them under-done on other days;