[Daisy Cowper reminisces about the rare event of children’s birthday parties, including her own, around the age of nine or ten. ‘The Mount’ refers to the street in Toxteth, Liverpool where Daisy grew up].

Then one of the little girls, who had brought her piece with her, would be pressed to occupy the piano stool, and being duly settled she would render in lively style “The Battle March of Delhi”, “The Robin’s Return”, and, as an encore, and more sentimentally, “The Maiden’s Prayer”. (Nearly all the little girls in the Mount had music lessons, 5/- a quarter, 6/6d. with some weird addition known as Theory- we didn’t understand what!—but the children learned to play very nicely indeed). Then some adult would be sure to suggest some “singing-all-together’ (no ‘community’ then), and at this my heart always sank. I had no love for songs or singing, was not blessed with a voice, and singing words seemed silly when it would be quicker and easier to say them! This musical part of the entertainment always included two songs, both wretchedly unhappy and inappropriate to a children’s party, but they were never omitted. “The Little Flower Seller” was one, and “Little Sister” was the other. I was a tender-hearted child and very sensitive to wailing sounds in music, so these two ditties induced in me a sense of utmost grief and made me want to weep aloud for misery, but it made saying Goodnight and going home to mother so joyful by contrast, that the finale seemed the best part of the whole affair.