She took a worn copy of Tennyson from the table, and began rapidly turning the leaves.
"I learned the whole thing yesterday," said Betty. "I can say every word of part first."
"It's easy," remarked Kitty. "I know part of it, although I'm not in the class. I learned it from hearing Allison read it:
"'Four gray walls and four gray towers
Overlook a space of flowers.
And the silent isle embowers
The Lady of Shalott.'
Isn't that right?"
"Yes, but that isn't Monday's lesson. It's part second we have to learn."
"Let's all learn it," proposed Katie. "It's so pretty and jingles along so easily I'd like to know it, too. You line it out, Allison, as Frazer does the hymns at the coloured baptizings, and we'll run a race and see who can repeat it first."
"There she weaves by night and day," read Allison, and then the five voices gabbled it all together, "There she weaves by night and day."
The concert recitation went on for some time, and presently the lines of the familiar old poem began weaving themselves into the story Mrs. Walton was thinking about. The red gold of the afterglow had not entirely faded from the sky when she left her seat by the window and went into the next room. The five girls on the hearth-rug were still chanting the lesson over and over.
"Come hear us say it, mother," called Kitty, drawing up a chair for her. "Betty learned it first."