“Mr Mawley,” said I, “you have no more imagination than a turnip-top! You must possess the taste of a Goth or Vandal, to turn such noble lines into your low ridicule!”
He did not mind my retort a bit, however. He seemed to think it beneath his notice; for, he only said “Thank you, Lorton!” and dropped back behind us again with Bessie Dasher, while Seraphine joined company with little Miss Pimpernell—Min and I being still together in front.
By-and-by our talk was resumed in the same strain from which the curate’s interpellation had diverted it. I had just spoken of Gay the fabulist. I told her of his sad history:—how it was shown in the bitter epitaph which he had composed for his own tomb—
“Life’s a jest, and all things show it;
I thought so once, and now I know it!”
From this we drifted on to Gray’s Elegy, through the near similarity of the two poets’ names.
“I think,” said Min, “that that unadded verse of his which is always left out of the published poem, is nicer than any of the regular ones; for it touches on two of my favourites, the violet and the dear little robin redbreast!”
“You mean, I suppose,” said I, “the one commencing—
“‘There, scatter’d oft, the earliest of the year—’”
“Yes,” said Min, continuing it in her low, sweet voice—
“‘By hands unseen, are showers of violets found;
The redbreast loves to build and warble there,
And little footsteps lightly print the ground.’”