PRIORESS.  I’d prove my vocal method without peer.

HIPPOLYTA.  Perhaps she could.

WIFE.  Suppose she does it here!

JUNIOR.  Never mind.  Miss Eglantine.  Did they call you Sister in those days?  Never mind.  I’ll play your accompaniment on the piano.

ALL.  Piano?

JUNIOR.  Why, yes, Oh I never thought that you wouldn’t know that. 
There’s a piano.

(The following passage can be omitted if a piano is not convenient.)

(They go over looking curiously at it.  The WIFE touches the keys by
     accident.  ALL jump at the sound.)

JUNIOR.  What do you want to sing?

PRIORESS. (slightly affected)
            Alas, I cannot sing without my notes.

WIFE.  Surely that is a line each reader quotes!

JUNIOR.  Do you know the Yama-Yama Girl? (substitute any popular song)

(The PRIORESS looks blank.)

JUNIOR.  Nor even the Merry Widow?

PRIORESS.  Why ’tis a thing that Chaucer never had,
            In his day seemly widows all were sad. 
            You speak of folk of whom I have no ken.

FIRST NUN.  One song, Madame, you know.

SECOND NUN.  O, try it then!

(The PRIORESS sings to the tune of the Old English Ballad, “Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes.”)

  Oh!  We are Chaucer’s children here,
    And well we love his name
  We live in hearts that hold him dear,
    Are nourished by his fame. 
  Oh, listen now, while thus we sing
    Our songs of olden days,
  When court and king and common folk
    United, voiced his praise.

  When I was once a little lasse
    At Stratford-on-the-Bowe
  I hastened daily to my classe,
    My one dream was to know. 
  I studied there, full seemly deep,
    With ne’er the smallest hint
  That other maids would some day weep,
    At seeing me in print.

  I thought of nothing but my booke,
    To make my mind grow fair
  So I’m afraid I never took
    The pains to do my hair!

(She looks at the JUNIOR’S hair.)

  Perchance if now I went to school,
    And sought its culture wide,
  Of coiffures strange I’d learn the rule,
    And scorn what was inside.

  Oh, gentle Chaucer, could you see
    The world around us here,
  Perhaps you’d change your poetry
    And call no pilgrim queer
  And could you see the ladies’ dress,
    And what they wear the while,
  You’d know what made the critics guess
    You had a simple style.

WIFE. (to EMILY)
            Look at her smile upon that silly miss! 
            Look, Emilye, did we come here for this? 
            As to her singing, well, I have heard worse! 
            I fear her verses will make her perverse.