It was very late, and I knew we
would not be interrupted. As she listened her
face grew longer and longer and her lips drooped
at the corners. Her disappointment was so obvious
that I had difficulty in finishing my recitation; but
I finally got through it, though rather weakly toward
the end, and waited to hear what she would say,
hoping against hope that she had liked it better
than she seemed to. But Susan B. Anthony was
the frankest as well as the kindest of women. Reso-
lutely she shook her head.
``It's no good, Anna,'' she said; firmly. ``You'll
have to do better. You've polished and repolished
that sermon until there's no life left in it. It's dead.
Besides, I don't care for your text.''
``Then give me a text,'' I demanded, gloomily.
``I can't,'' said Aunt Susan.
I was tired and bitterly disappointed, and both
conditions showed in my reply.
``Well,'' I asked, somberly, ``if you can't even
supply a text, how do you suppose I'm going to
deliver a brand-new sermon at ten o'clock to-morrow
morning?''
``Oh,'' declared Aunt Susan, blithely, ``you'll find
a text.''
I suggested several, but she did not like them.
At last I said, ``I have it--`Let no man take thy
crown.' ''
``That's it!'' exclaimed Miss Anthony. ``Give us
a good sermon on that text.''
She went to her room to sleep the sleep of the
just and the untroubled, but I tossed in my bed the
rest of the night, planning the points of the new
sermon.
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