"Thank you for a hint," cried Jasper, pulling out his pencil. "I didn't say 'fair'; that's better than 'gentle.' I wish critics would always be so useful as to give one good idea. Heigho! here goes again:
"'Fair ladies and brave sirs,
The player's art is to amuse,
Instruct, or to confuse
By too much good advice,
But poorly given:
That no one follows, because, forsooth,
'Tis thrown at him, neck and heels.
The drama, pure and simple, is forgot
In tugging in the moral'"?
"I thought you were going to alter 'tugging in' to something more elegant," said Polly.
"Lugging in," suggested Clare, with another laugh.
"Morals are always tugged in by the head and shoulders," said Jasper.
"Why not say so?"
"We should have pretty much the whole anatomy of the human form divine, if you had your way," cried Clare. "Listen!
"'Because, forsooth, 'tis thrown at him, neck and heels' and 'Tugging in the moral, head and shoulders.' Now just add 'by the pricking of my thumbs,' etc., and you have them all."
Jasper joined as well as Polly and Ben in the laugh at the prologue's expense, but Phronsie sat erect winking hard, her royal hands folded quite still in her lap.
"You're bound for a newspaper office, my boy," said Jasper at length. "How you will cut into the coming poet, and maul the fledgling of the prose writer! Well, I stand corrected.
"'The drama pure and simple,
Is forgot, in straining at the moral.'"
"Is that any better?" (To the audience.)