there is a comma, splitting the line into two parts. And if you draw a line down through every one of these commas, dividing the written verse into two halves, each separate half will be a poem of itself, and the secret and concealed meaning of the whole will then be apparent.”

She laid the paper in my hands; instantly everybody, a-tiptoe with curiosity, clustered around to see. And this is what we all read — the prettiest and most cunningly devised and disguised verse that ever was writ — or so it seems to me:

“Hark — hark the trumpet sounds, the din of war’s alarms O’er seas and solid grounds, doth call us all to arms, Who for King George doth stand, their honour soon shall shine, Their ruin is at hand, who with the Congress join.