“Oo may leave off playing now, Sylvie. I can do the uvver tune much better wizout a compliment.”
“He means ‘without accompaniment,’” Sylvie whispered, smiling at my puzzled look: and she pretended to shut up the stops of the organ.
“The Badgers did not care to talk to Fish:
They did not dote on Herrings’ songs:
They never had experienced the dish
To which that name belongs:
‘And oh, to pinch their tails,’ (this was their wish,)
‘With tongs, yea, tongs, and tongs!’”
I ought to mention that he marked the parenthesis, in the air, with his finger. It seemed to me a very good plan. You know there’s no sound to represent it—any more than there is for a question.
Suppose you have said to your friend, “You are better to-day,” and that you want him to understand that you are asking him a question, what can be simpler than just to make a ‘?’ in the air with your finger? He would understand you in a moment!