and sang all
our childhood. When Marjorie was seven and I was six we sang Even-song
at the village church, as the members of the regular choir were ill or
absent. Marjorie had a heavenly childish soprano and I a heavy
nondescript voice. But I always pleased my father by singing real
"second voice" and not just following the soprano in thirds.

He used to give us a note, and we then had to run round our rather large
house humming it. It was the deepest disgrace we ever knew if we had
sharped or flatted when we got back to the starting point. He taught us
musical terms by making us dance to different rhythms he played, and
would call out "Allegro," "Vivace," "Adagio," "Molto allegro," "Legato,"
and so forth, to which we had to change instantly. Whenever any one came
to the house, we played and sang for them, and though it might have been
rather awful for the visitors it was very good for us to get used to an
audience.

He used to arrange fairy tales like "Bluebeard" in doggerel verses and
write accompaniments to them, and we then learned them by heart and
rehearsed them, and some grand night played them for all the neighbours.
I remember the way we showed Bluebeard's chamber where the heads of his
wives were kept. We hung a sheet on the wall and Marjorie and I stood in
front of it, with pale faces, closed eyes and open mouths, and our long
hair pinned up high above our heads on the sheet. Another sheet was then
stretched across us, just below our chins, and the effect was rather
ghastly in a dim light. I remember we sang at the last:

"Oh, Bluebeard, oh, Bluebeard,
Frustrated, checkmated,
Dissipated, agitated,
Castigated, lacerated,
Bluebeard!"

When school was over we always gave a dramatic performance; if the
weather was fine enough we held them in the big garden that was our
childhood's playground. We dressed behind a huge flowering-currant bush,
and I can remember a performance of an act of "Twelfth Night," in which
I, aged about seven, was _Malvolio_, Lal, my brother, _Maria_, and
Marjorie, _Olivia_.

I had always been able to sing, but the sudden growth of my voice was a
surprise. One day, in school, we were asked to write a composition on
our favourite wish. All the other girls said they wished for curly hair,
for pretty dresses, for as much candy as they could eat, for any other
frivolous thing that came into their heads. But I took it seriously and
told my dearest wish in all the w