"Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing his heart out in a woful ballad—
m—m—m—Ah!—
Made to his mistress' eyebrow."
He chuckled audibly a moment, and then, speaking a little louder:
"Fenton to the life, poor lad!" he said.
Phœbe sat up very straight with a startled movement. Oh, to think of it! That she should have forgotten Sir Guy! To have sought Will Shakespeare for the sole purpose of tracing her threatened lover—and then to forget him for a simple name—a mere celebrity!
Unconscious of the small inward drama so near at hand, the playwright proceeded with his composition.
"'Sighing his heart out,'" he mused. "Nay, that were too strong a touch for Jacques. Lighter—lighter." Then, after a moment of thought: "Ay—ay!" he chuckled. "'Sighing like furnace'—poor Fenton! How like a very furnace in his dolor! Yet did he justice to the Canary. So—so! To go back now:
"Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace with a woful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow."
'Twill pass, in sooth, 'twill pass!"