promised to write me getting on? Have you done them
yet?"

"I have done something," she answered, modestly, "but I really do not
think that they are worth producing. It is very tiresome of you to
have remembered about them."

Arthur, however, by this time knew enough of Angela's abilities to be
sure that her "something" would be something more or less worth
hearing, and mildly insisted on their production, and then, to her
confusion, on her reading them aloud. They ran as follows, and
whatever Angela's opinion of them may have been, the reader shall
judge of them for himself:

A STORM ON THE STRINGS

"The minstrel sat in his lonely room,
Its walls were bare, and the twilight grey
Fell and crept and gathered to gloom;
It came like the ghost of the dying day,
And the chords fell hushed and low.
Pianissimo!

"His arm was raised, and the violin
Quivered and shook with the strain it bore,
While the swelling forth of the sounds within
Rose with a sweetness unknown before,
And the chords fell soft and low.
Piano!

"The first cold flap of the tempest's wings
Clashed with the silence before the storm,
The raindrops pattered across the strings
As the gathering thunder-clouds took form--
Drip, drop, high and low.
Staccato!

"Heavily rolling the thunder roared,
Sudden and jagged the lightning played,
Faster and faster the raindrops poured,
Sobbing and surging the tree-crests swayed,
Cracking and crashing above, below.
Crescendo!

"The wind tore howling across the wold,
And tangled his train in the groaning trees,
Wrapped the dense clouds in his mantle cold,
Then shivered and died in a wailing breeze,
Whistling and weeping high and low,
Sostenuto!

"A pale sun broke from the driving cloud,
And flashed in the raindrops serenely cool:
At the touch of his finger the forest bowed,
As it shimmered and glanced in the ruffled pool,
While the rustling leaves soughed soft and low.