"Do you mean nursery verses and all?" asked Dan. Kitty nodded; her brain was already busy.
"I think it will be lovely," said Betty. "I know quite a lot."
"Go ahead then," urged Dan, "and remember to give author and book."
"Nursery verses and nursery rhymes haven't got any author," said Betty with a very superior air.
Dan was on the alert at once; he loved to torment Betty.
"No author! Oh! oh! what an appalling display of childish ignorance," he cried in pretended horror, "and after all the trouble I have taken with you too. My dear child, don't you know that some one must have composed them or they wouldn't be—but there, I suppose little children can't be expected to understand these things."
"But I do," cried Betty indignantly. "You don't know all I know.
I know a great deal more than you think, though you may not think so."
"Dear me! Do you really now?" said Dan, pretending to be enormously impressed. "What a genius we may have in the family without our ever suspecting it. Tell us who wrote:
"'And when they were dead,
The robins so red
Took strawberry leaves and over them spread,'"
"What would be the good?" said Betty, with a sigh as if of hopeless despair. "You wouldn't reckernize the name if I told you."