“That went splendidly,” declared Peggy, her face aglow, when the last verse had filled the room with melody. “Now, what about ‘The Star Spangled Banner?’ Can you play that, Jerry? It’s a lot harder than the other.”
“You bet it’s harder, but I can play it all right.” Jerry instantly proved his boast by striking the introductory chords, winding up with an ambitious flourish. “Now,” he said, with a nod, and the chorus burst out lustily, Priscilla’s voice leading.
“O, say, can you see by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming.”
The chorus, strong on the first line, weakened on the second. Priscilla sang through the third alone, and then came to a full stop. Jerry drummed a few further chords, and broke off to demand, “What’s the matter?”
“Why, I’ve forgotten just how that goes,” cried Priscilla. “What is the next, anyway?”
After a protracted struggle, in which each girl racked her memory and contributed such fragments as she could recall, four lines were patched into comparative completeness. But, beyond this, their allied efforts could not carry them. For the second time that day, Peggy included herself in her stern denunciation.
“It’s perfectly appalling. We didn’t know how many states there were, we didn’t know about the stripes on the flag, and now we don’t know ‘The Star Spangled Banner.’ It’s a disgrace. Not a single person in this room knows ‘The Star Spangled Banner.’”
“Oh, all right. You can teach it to the rest of us, then,” declared Peggy, and for the next hour the drilling went forward relentlessly. The company repeated each verse in chorus till there was no sign of doubt or hesitation, and then sang it through. When the verses had been mastered separately, the entire song was rendered with telling effect. Aunt Abigail clapped her hands.
“I’ve often wondered why the English and the Germans were so much better posted on their national songs than we are. If all patriotic young Americans took this sensible way of spending a rainy Fourth of July, our critics would have one less arrow in their quiver.”