“I did the Erl King,” said Valetta.
“‘Who rideth so late in the forest so wild?
It is the fond father and his loving child.’”
“Oh, spare us, Val,” cried her sister Gillian. “Every one has done that.”
“Gerald parodied mine,” said Anna.
“‘Who trampeth so late in a shocking bad hat?
‘Tis the tipsy old father a-hugging his brat.”
“Oh, go on.”
“I can’t recollect any more, but the Erl King’s daughter is a beggar-woman, and it ends with—
“I’ll give thee a tanner and make him a bait,
So in the gin palace was settled his fate.”
Some of the party were scandalized, others laughed as much or more than the effusion deserved.
“We accept drawings,” added another voice, “and if any one does anything extraordinarily good in that way, or in writing, it makes a little book.”