that the woman who had done that work had decided to remain. I was
asked by Mr. Crittenden, "Can you read?" "Yes, I think so." "Then come
with me." He touched a bell and then escorted me to the large chapel
capable of holding nearly twelve hundred, where I found the entire
faculty assembled to listen to my efforts. I was requested to stand up
in the pulpit and read from a large Bible the fourteenth chapter of
John, and the twenty-third psalm. That was easy enough. Next request,
"Please recite something comic." I gave them "Comic Miseries." "Now
try a little pathos." I recited Alice Cary's "The Volunteer," which
was one of my favourite poems. Then I heard a professor say to Mr.
Crittenden, "She recites with great taste and expression; what a pity
she has that lisp!" And hitherto I had been blissfully unaware of such
a failing. One other selection in every-day prose, and I was let off.
The faculty were now exchanging their opinions and soon dispersed
without one word to me. I said to Mr. Crittenden, as I came down the
pulpit stairs, "I do not want to take the place." But he insisted that
they all wanted me to come and begin work at once. I had large
classes, number of pupils eight hundred and fifty. It was a great
opportunity to help young girls to read in such a way that it would be
a pleasure to their home friends, or to recite in company, as was
common then, naturally and without gestures. I took one more class of
little girls who had received no training before in that direction.
They were easy to inspire, were wholly free from self-consciousness,
and their parents were so much pleased that we gave an exhibition of
what they could do in reading and recitation in combination with their
gymnastics. The chapel was crowded to the doors. A plump little German
girl was the star of the evening. She stood perfectly serene, her
chubby arms stuck out stiffly from her sides, and in a loud, clear
voice she recited this nonsense: