"DO ye? Well watch THEM an' mebbe ye won't mind me singin' so much. An' afther all ye're only a farmer, aren't ye?"
"Hardly that," and Jerry laughed again.
Her fingers played lightly over the keys for a moment.
"This is called 'A Temple to Friendship,'" she explained.
"Indeed?"
"And it's about a girl who built a shrine and she thought she wanted to put 'Friendship' into it. She THOUGHT she wanted 'Friendship.' Afther a while she found out her mistake. Listen:" And Peg sang, in a pure, tremulous little voice that vibrated with feeling the following:
"'A temple to Friendship,' said Laura enchanted,
'I'll build in this garden: the thought is divine!'
Her temple was built and she now only wanted
An Image of Friendship to place on the shrine.
She flew to a sculptor who set down before her
A Friendship the fairest his art could invent!
But so cold and so dull that the Youthful adorer
Saw plainly this was not the idol she meant.
'Oh! never,' she cried, 'could I think of enshrining
An image whose looks are so joyless and dim—
But yon little god (Cupid) upon roses reclining,
We'll make, if you please, sir, a Friendship of him.'
So the bargain was struck; with the little god laden
She joyfully flew to her shrine in the grove:
'Farewell,' said the sculptor, 'you're not the first maiden
Who came but for Friendship and took away—Love.'"