“The drowsy year from winter’s sleep ye wake,
Yet two of ye do not a summer make.”
“‘Well,’ said he, grinning, ‘you’d better tell her straight off it’s bosh, and then she’s not likely to make a fool of herself again. Hullo, though, I say,’ he exclaimed, picking up a paper in front of him, every smudge and blot of which I knew only too well, ‘why, she’s at it again. What’s this?
“‘“Ancient and Mod—” Why, it’s in your writing; did you copy it out for her?’
“‘I wrote that out, yes,’ said I, feeling it my turn to colour up and look sheepish.
“Waterford glanced rapidly through the first few lines, and then said,—
“‘Well, all I can say is, it’s a pity she didn’t stick to poetry. I’m sure the line about waking the drowsy year is a jolly sight better than this awful rot.’
“‘Though we are not told so in so many words, we may reasonably conclude that athletic sports were not unpractised by Cain and Abel prior to the death of the latter!
“‘As if they could have done it after!’
“‘I never said they could,’ I said, feeling very much taken down.
“‘Oh—it was you composed it as well as wrote it, was it?’ said he laughing. ‘Ho, ho! that’s the best joke I ever heard. Poor little Crisp, what a shame to get her to father—or mother a thing like this; ha, ha! “prior to the death of the latter”—that’s something like a play of language! My eye, what a game she’s been having with us!’