“A tall figure, all in white with a veil over its face and a lamp in its wasted hand,” went on Meg.  “It beckoned, gliding noiselessly before him down a corridor as dark and cold as any tomb.  Shadowy effigies in armor stood on either side, a dead silence reigned, the lamp burned blue, and the ghostly figure ever and anon turned its face toward him, showing the glitter of awful eyes through its white veil.  They reached a curtained door, behind which sounded lovely music.  He sprang forward to enter, but the specter plucked him back, and waved threateningly before him a . . .”

“Snuffbox,” said Jo, in a sepulchral tone, which convulsed the audience. “‘Thankee,’ said the knight politely, as he took a pinch and sneezed seven times so violently that his head fell off.  ’Ha!  Ha!’ laughed the ghost, and having peeped through the keyhole at the princesses spinning away for dear life, the evil spirit picked up her victim and put him in a large tin box, where there were eleven other knights packed together without their heads, like sardines, who all rose and began to . . .”

“Dance a hornpipe,” cut in Fred, as Jo paused for breath, “and, as they danced, the rubbishy old castle turned to a man-of-war in full sail.  ’Up with the jib, reef the tops’l halliards, helm hard alee, and man the guns!’ roared the captain, as a Portuguese pirate hove in sight, with a flag black as ink flying from her foremast.  ‘Go in and win, my hearties!’ says the captain, and a tremendous fight began.  Of course the British beat—­they always do.”

“No, they don’t!” cried Jo, aside.

“Having taken the pirate captain prisoner, sailed slap over the schooner, whose decks were piled high with dead and whose lee scuppers ran blood, for the order had been ’Cutlasses, and die hard!’ ’Bosun’s mate, take a bight of the flying-jib sheet, and start this villain if he doesn’t confess his sins double quick,’ said the British captain.  The Portuguese held his tongue like a brick, and walked the plank, while the jolly tars cheered like mad.  But the sly dog dived, came up under the man-of-war, scuttled her, and down she went, with all sail set, ’To the bottom of the sea, sea, sea’ where . . .”

“Oh, gracious!  What shall I say?” cried Sallie, as Fred ended his rigmarole, in which he had jumbled together pell-mell nautical phrases and facts out of one of his favorite books.  “Well, they went to the bottom, and a nice mermaid welcomed them, but was much grieved on finding the box of headless knights, and kindly pickled them in brine, hoping to discover the mystery about them, for being a woman, she was curious.  By-and-by a diver came down, and the mermaid said, ’I’ll give you a box of pearls if you can take it up,’ for she wanted to restore the poor things to life, and couldn’t raise the heavy load herself.  So the diver hoisted it up, and was much disappointed on opening it to find no pearls.  He left it in a great lonely field, where it was found by a . . .”