Mrs. Roberts was not a good reader, and was aware of it. She
pronounced the words correctly, it is true; but when you had said that,
you had said all that there was to offer in praise of her effort. She
had some exasperating faults. But she bravely read the two verses, and
some of the boys listened, and one of them laughed; he had caught a
gleam of the fun in the poem. This, of course, was Nimble Dick.
Then Alfred Ried made the same effort on the same verses; his
performance was very little better, and he, too, knew it. He could
write, but he was by no means a public reader; this was his offering to
the general good. If those fellows, by reason of his mistakes, could be
induced to climb, he was willing to offer his pride on the altar. No
matter by what petty trials they were caught so that they were really
caught.
Then followed Gracie Dennis, and her own father, acceptable preacher
though he was, might with credit to himself have taken lessons of her.
She was certainly, for one so young and so unprofessional, a magnificent
reader. So indeed was Marion Wilbur, and she had enjoyed teaching
Gracie.
The poem blossomed in her hand. The crunching of nuts and apples
entirely ceased. The boys sat erect and listened and laughed and flushed
and swallowed suspiciously over some of the homely pathos.
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