Elizabeth was studying her part. We were all studying our parts; but we stopped to listen to this glowing bit of declamation, which Elizabeth delivered with unbroken calm. "I drop down on my knees when I say that," she observed gloomily. We looked at her with admiring, envious eyes. Our own rôles offered no such golden opportunities. Lilly's, indeed, was almost as easily learned as Snug's, being limited to three words, "The Christian slave?" which were supposed to be spoken interrogatively; but which she invariably pronounced as an abstract statement, bearing on nothing in particular. It was seldom, however, that we insignificant little girls of the Second Cours were permitted to take part in any play, and we felt to the full the honour and glory of our positions. "I come on in three scenes, and speak eleven times," I said, with a pride which I think now strongly resembled Mr. Rushworth's. "What are you, Tony?" "A beggar child," said Tony. "I cry 'Bread! bread!' in piercing accents" (she was reading from the stage directions), "and afterwards say to Zara,--that's Mary Orr,--'Our thanks are due to thee, noble lady, who from thy abundance feeds us once. Our love and blessings follow her who gave us daily of her slender store.'" "Is that all?" "The other beggar child says nothing but 'Bread! bread!'" replied Tony stiffly. "What a lot of costumes to get up for so many little parts!" commented Elizabeth, ever prone to consider the practical aspect of things. "I am dressed in rags," said Tony. "They oughtn't to give much trouble." "Lilly and I are to be dressed alike," I said. "'Slaves of the royal household.' Madame Rayburn said we were to wear Turkish trousers of yellow muslin, with blue tunics, and red sashes tied at the side. Won't we look like guys?" I spoke with affected disdain and real complacency, gloating--like Mr. Rushworth--over the finery I pretended to despise. Elizabeth stared at us dispassionately. "Lilly will look well in anything," she remarked with disconcerting candour, at which Lilly blushed a lovely rose pink. She knew how pretty she was, but she had that exquisite sweetness of temper which is so natural an accompaniment of beauty. Perhaps we should all be sweet-tempered if we could feel sure that people looked at us with pleasure. "You will have to wear Turkish trousers, too," said Tony maliciously to Elizabeth; "and get down on your knees in them." "No, I won't," returned Elizabeth scornfully. "I'm not a Turk. I'm a Moorish princess,--Zara's niece." "Moors and Turks are the same," said Tony with conviction. "Moors and Turks are not the same," said Elizabeth. "Turks live in Turkey, and Moors live--Whereabouts is this play, anyway, Marie?" "Granada," said Marie. "The Spanish army, under Ferdinand and Isabella, is besieging Granada. I wish I were a Moor instead of a pious Spanish lady. It would be a great deal more fun. I've always got pious parts."