"It's blank bad verse, if you ask me," said Naomi Pryse, with a nod that was meant to finish him; but it only lifted him out of his chair.
"Well, upon my word," said the piano-tuner, striding noisily up and down, as Naomi laughed. "Upon my word!"
"Please make me understand," pleaded the girl, with a humility that meant mischief, if he had only been listening; but he was still wrestling with his exasperation. "I can't help being ignorant, you know," she added, as though hurt.
"You can help it—that's just it!" he answered, bitterly. "I've been telling you one of the most beautiful things that Tennyson himself ever wrote, and you say it isn't verse. Verse, forsooth! It's poetry—it's gorgeous poetry!"
"It may be gorgeous, but I don't call it poetry unless it rhymes," said Naomi, stoutly. "Gordon always does."
Gordon, the Australian poet, she was forever throwing at his head, as the equal of any of his English bards. They had already had a heated argument about Gordon. Therefore Engelhardt said merely:
"You're joking, of course?"
"I am doing nothing of the sort."
"Then pray what do you call Shakespeare"—pausing in front of her with his hand in his pocket—"poetry or prose?"