NG BEFORE THE QUEEN

"Sir Fly hangs dead on the window-pane;
The frost doth wind his shroud;
Through the halls of his little summer house
The north wind cries aloud.
We will bury his bones in the mouldy wall,
And mourn for the noble slain:
A southerly wind and a sunny sky--
Buzz! up he comes again!
Oh, Master Fly!"

Nick looked up from the music-rack and shivered. He had forgotten the
fire in studying his song, and the blackened ends of the burnt-out logs
lay smouldering on the hearth. The draught, too, whistled shrilly under
the door, in spite of the rushes that he had piled along the crack.

The fog had been gone for a week. It was snapping cold; and through the
peep-holes he had thawed upon the window-pane with his breath, he could
see the hoar-frost lying in the shadow of the wall in the court below.

How forlorn the green old dial looked out there alone in the cold, with
the winter dust whirling around it in little eddies upon the wind! The
dial was fringed with icicles, like an old man's beard; and even the
creeping shadow on its face, which told mid-afternoon, seemed frozen
where it fell.

Mid-afternoon already, and he so much to do! Nick pulled his cloak about
him, and turned to his song again:

"Sir Fly hangs dead on the window-pane;
The frost doth wind his shroud--"

But there he stopped; for the boys were singing in the great hall below,
and the whole house rang with the sound of the roaring chorus:

"Down-a-down, hey, down-a-down,
Hey derry derry down-a-down!"

Nick put his fingers in his ears, and began all over again:

"Sir Fly hangs dead on the window-pane;
The frost doth wind his shroud;
Through the halls of his little summer house
The north wind cries aloud."

But it was no use; all he could hear was:

"Down-a-down, hey, down-a-down,
Hey derry derry down-a-down!"

How could a fellow study in a noise like that? He gave it up in despair,
and kicking the chunks together, stood upon the hearth, warming his
hands by the gathering blaze while he listened to the song:

"Cold's the wind, and wet's the rain;
Saint Hugh, be our good speed!
Ill is the weather that bringeth no gain,
Nor helps good hearts in need.

"Down-a-down, hey, down-a-down,
Hey derry derry down-a-down!"

He could hear Colley Warren above them all. What a