Buzza's
ear.
But at length the signal would be given by Miss Priscilla.
"Come, a little music perhaps might leave a pleasant taste.
What do you say, Vicar?"
Upon which the Vicar would regularly murmur--
"Say, rather, would gild refined gold, Miss Limpenny."
And the Admiral as invariably broke in with--
"Come, Sophy! remember the proverb about little birds that can sing
and won't sing."
This prelude having been duly recited, the Misses Buzza would
together trip to the piano, on which the two younger girls in duet
were used to accompany Sophia's artless ballads. The performance
gained a character of its own from a habit to which Calypso clung, of
counting the time in an audible aside: as thus--
_Sophia_ (singing): "Oh, breathe but a whispered command."
_Calypso: "One, two, three, four_."
_Sophia_: "I'll lay down my life for thee!"
_Calypso: "One, two, three, four_."
--the effect of which upon strangers has been known to be paralysing,
though we who were _cumeelfo_ pretended not to notice it. But Sophy
could also accompany her own songs, such as, "Will you love me then
as now?" and "I'd rather be a daisy," with much feeling. She was
clever, too, with the water-colour brush, and to her we owe that
picture of "_ H.M.
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