Solon Denney and Lucy Tait."

Was not this followed by one more subtle, more pointed, more ribald?

"Solon's mad and I'm glad,
and I know what will please him;
a bottle of wine to make him shine
and Lucy Tait to tease him!"

I thought there was an inhuman, devilish deftness in the rhymes. The
mighty mechanism of English verse had been employed to proclaim my
remoteness from my love.

And yet the gods were once graciously good to me. One wondrous evening
before hope died utterly I survived the ordeal of walking home with her
from church.

She came with her aunt, uncle, and I present by the god's permission,
surmised that she might leave them and go to her own home alone when
church was out. Through that service I worshipped her golden braids and
the pink roses on her leghorn hat. And when they sang, "Praise God from
whom all blessings flow!" my voice soared fervently in the words, for I
had satisfied myself by much craning of the neck that Solon Denney was
not present. Even now the Doxology revives within me that mixed emotion
of relief at his absence and apprehension for the approaching encounter
with her.

She passed me at the portals of the house of a double worship, said good
night to aunt and uncle--and I was at her side.