No. XXIII.—A MORAL PRECEPT
The following obscure legend was worked on an old sampler, in the red cross-stitch that found favour when our grandmothers were girls:—
Elizabeth out
Rue Constantine
Very thin gloves
Way Susan dart.
This was evidently some excellent moral precept, but it hung on its frame, a mere puzzle on the school-room wall, until an expert word juggler came that way, and solved the mystery by reading it off thus:—
“Eliza be thou true, constant in everything. Love sways us, and art.”
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In the following lines the first missing word has two letters, and the letters are carried on, with one more added each time, and in varied order, throughout the verses, either in single words or in groups of words:—
A lover of .. unkind fair
Were less than ... did he not ....
“Mine is no ..... life, I swear,
It dwells in this ...... alone.
Grant me thy love, like ....... chaste
.. ...... lest thou live unwooed,
..... .. . lowly life to waste
The treasures of sweet ..........”