“’The thunder rolls,
The lightning flashes!’

“Over and over again I repeated those lines, and I could not get past them.  The teacher looked sorry for me, and some of the boys and girls began to laugh.  This made it all the worse for me, and my face grew red.  Over and over again I told about the thunder and lightning, and at last I made up my mind I’d have to do something, or else go to my seat as some of the other girls had done, without finishing.  And I didn’t want to do that.

“So I braced my feet on the platform, and then I stood straight up in front of the whole school and fairly shouted out this verse: 

“’The thunder rolls,
The lightning flashes! 
It broke Grandmother’s teapot
All to smashes!’

“That’s what I gave as my first recitation,” went on Mrs. Brown, when Bunny and Sue had finished laughing.  “How those words about my grandmother’s teapot popped into my head I don’t know.  I don’t even remember my grandmother’s teapot, though I suppose she had one.  But that’s the verse I recited.  And you should have heard the children laugh!”

“What did the teacher say?” asked Bunny.

“At the time I thought she was rather angry,” answered his mother, “thinking I had done it on purpose, to make fun of the speaking.  But really I had not.  The wrong two lines popped into my head all of a sudden.  And of course; they spoiled the piece.  I know now, too, that she was trying to keep from laughing, and that made her look stern.”

“I hope that doesn’t happen to us,” said Sue, as she and Bunny thought over the little story their mother had told them.

“I hope not, either,” agreed her brother.  “Come on—­let’s go up in the attic and practice.”

So they did, and for some time they went over the lines they were to speak on the stage.  After a while Lucile and Mart came in and helped Bunny and Sue.  The older boy and girl said the two little ones were doing very well.  Mr. Treadwell, too, who heard Bunny and Sue go through their parts, said they did very well.

“We’ll have a good practice to-morrow,” said the impersonator.

Then Mr. Treadwell called a dress rehearsal.  That is generally the last one before the show, and it is really a complete performance in itself, though the audience isn’t allowed to come in.

The day before Christmas Bunny, Sue, Lucile, Mart, and the other girls and boys assembled in the hall over the hardware store for the dress rehearsal.  Mr. Treadwell was there, and the men who were to help set up the scenery were on hand.

Just before it was time for the rehearsal to begin George Watson went up to Mr. Treadwell.

“If you please,” said he, “couldn’t Peter be in the play?”

“Peter?  Who is Peter?” asked the impersonator.  “I’m afraid it’s too late to put any one else in, George.  They wouldn’t have time to practice, and, besides, we really have all the actors we need.”