'And you have it still,' said Elizabeth; 'deliver it up, if you please; it is the best of all, I can tell you, I had a cursory view of it.'
'No, no,' said Anne, who saw that her brother meant to teaze her, and not to restore her verses; 'it was a very poor performance, it is much better for my fame that it should never be seen. Only think what a sublime notion the world will have of it, when it is said that even the great Rupert himself is afraid to let it appear.'
Elizabeth made another attempt to regain the poem, but without effect, and Anne recalled the attention of all to Helen's verses.
'What is a pennant?' said Elizabeth; 'I do not like words to be twisted for the sake of the rhyme.'
A flag,' said Helen.
'I never doubted that you intended it for a flag,' said Elizabeth; 'but what I complain of is, that it is a transmogrified pennon.'
'I believe a pennant to be a kind of flag,' said Helen.
'Let us refer the question to Papa,' said Anne, 'as soon as he has finished that interminable conversation with Uncle Woodbourne.'
'Really, in spite of that slight blemish,' said Elizabeth, 'your poem is the best we have heard, Helen.'
'And I can testify,' said Rupert, 'that the description of the cart-horses at Dykelands is perfectly correct. But, Helen, is it true that your friend Dicky has been seized with a fit of martial ardour such as you describe?'