Conversation is being carried on in rather a desultory sort of fashion, the only variety being Dick's persistence in asking riddles, which are invariably proved to have no answers.
Discussion waxes warm presently on the subject of that beautiful poem on the letter H, often attributed to Lord Byron, but written by Catherine Fanshawe. Dick protests loudly that it is Shelley's, while Honor and Doris are equally sure it is Byron's.
"What do you say, Miss Denny?" asked Doris raising herself on to her elbow and looking up from her place on the hearth-rug. "You know everything, so surely you can settle the question."
"I was not aware that I am such a walking encyclopædia as you seem to imagine," replies Miss Denison laughing, and shaking out a skein of wool preparatory to placing it on Molly's hands; "and, to tell you the truth, Doris, my own personal experience is that the more one learns, the more one finds there is to learn. At the present moment I cannot recollect the author of that enigma, but my impression is that you are both wrong, though I could not say so for certain. Now, who can recite it without a mistake? If someone can, very likely I shall call to mind the name of the author. But first ring the bell, Dick; Daisy and Bobby must go to bed."
"A capital idea!" cries Dick, referring to the suggestion about the poem, "and I'll give anyone who says it through without a single hitch a whole packet of butterscotch. There!"
"I don't believe you have got the money to buy it," says Molly crushingly; "for I heard you only this morning bewailing the fact that you had only three halfpence left in the wide world."
"You can get penny packets," mutters Dick; but he is promptly suppressed, for Honor in a clear melodious voice is already beginning—
"'Twas whispered in heaven, 'twas muttered in hell,
And echo caught faintly the sound as it fell;
On the confines of earth 'twas permitted to rest,
And the depths of the ocean its presence confessed.
'Twill be found in the sphere when 'tis riven asunder,
Be seen in the lightning, and heard in the thunder.
'Twas allotted to man in his earliest breath,
Attends at his birth, and awaits him at death.
It presides o'er his happiness, honour, and health,
Is the prop of his house and the end of his wealth.
Without it the soldier and seaman may roam,
But woe to the wretch who expels it from home.
In the whispers of conscience its voice will be found,
Nor e'en in the whirlwind of passion be drowned.
'Twill not soften the heart, and though deaf to the ear,
'Twill make it acutely and instantly hear.
But in shade let it rest, like a delicate flower—
Oh, breathe on it softly—it dies in an hour.'"
A burst of applause greets Honor as she steps down from the footstool upon which Molly has previously handed her with much ceremony. No one, however, seems any nearer settling the author than before.
"Most annoying, to be sure," says Miss Denison, tapping the fender impatiently with her foot; "I do dislike to be baffled like this. I'll tell you what, we will send down and ask your father to let us have both Byron and Shelley from the study. After all I think it must be one of those two—anyway, we will search until we do find it. Now, who will be my ambassador?"