drooping. Poor roses, perhaps you are lonely away from the garden; but
you shall sleep near me, and there is a star rising up in the sky; it
will watch us all through the night." Then the child nestled down in
his white bed--he and his little warm heart, in which there was love
for all things. While he slept the roses looked at his pale little face
and sighed, and presently they stole softly on to his cheeks and rested
there. The children saw them still there when the summer was over; when
the garland was quite dead, and lame Mary longed for the fields no
more.
ROUND THE TEA-TABLE.
A nice little party we're seated at tea,
The dollies all seem very glad,
Save the poor little thing who is leaning on me;
I fear that she feels rather bad;
Poor limp little thing! she wants a back-bone,
She's only just made up of rag.
There's little Miss Prim sitting up all alone,
And the Japanese looks like a wag.
Now what shall we talk of, my own dollies fair?
And what shall we give you for tea?
That queer little thing with the short frizzy hair,
Why does he keep looking at me?
My sister and I we will sing you a song
Before we get up from the table;
It shall not be sad, and it shall not be long--
We'll sing it as well as we're able.
SONG.
The darkness is stealing all over the place,
The flowers are weeping for sorrow,
The daisy is hiding its little round face,
The sun has gone seeking to-morrow.
So while you are seated all round the tea-table,
Please join in the chorus as well as you're able;
O! sing! sing away for your life.
CHORUS.
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
Time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
So bring me the carving-knife.
The darkness is hiding the birds on the trees,
The thrushes are weary of singing,
A strange little rumour is borne on the breeze
Of Summer the swallows are bringing.
So while you are seated all round the tea-table,
Please join in the chorus as well as you're able;
O! sing! sing away for your life.
CHORUS.
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
Time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
So bring me the carving-knife.
The Summer is stealing all over the place,
The wind is all scented with roses,
The dear little birds are all flying a race,
On purpose to give us their noses.
So while you are seated all round the tea-table,
Please join in the chorus as well as you're able;
O! sing! sing away for your life.
CHORUS.
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses
Time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
It's time to cut off the dicky birds' noses,
So bring me the carving-knife.
TOMMY.
Tommy was sitting on the bench near the end of the lane. By his side
was a basin tied up in a cotton handkerchief; in the buttonhole of his
coat there was a sprig of sweet-william. The girls from the big house
came and stood still in front of him, staring at him rudely, but he did
not speak.
"Tommy, are you tired?" they asked.
"Yes," Tommy answered, crossly, "I'm very tired, and father's working
in the fields, and I have got to take him his dinner before I go to the
fair."
"Why don't the servants take it?"
"Servants!" said Tommy scornfully; "we've no servants. We are not rich
people!"
"Wouldn't you like to be rich?" the eldest sister asked, while the two
little ones walked slowly round Tommy, looking at the feather in his
hat; he had put it there so that he might look smart when he went on to
the village.
"No, it's too expensive," said Tommy, shaking his head; "rich people
have to buy such a lot of things, and to wear fine clothes, and they
can't have dinner in the fields."
"My father has his dinner in a room," said the girl.
"That's because he's rich," answered Tommy, "and people would talk if
he didn't; rich people can't do as they like, as poor can."
"And my father lives in a big house," the girl went on, for she was
vulgar, and liked to boast.
"Yes, and it takes up a lot of room; my father's got the whole world to
live in if he likes; that's better than a house."
"But my father doesn't work," said the girl, scornfully.
"Mine does," said Tommy, proudly. "Rich people can't work," he went on,
"so they are obliged to get the poor folk to do it. Why, we have made
everything in the world. Oh! it's a fine thing to be poor."
"But suppose all the rich folk died, what would the poor folk do?"
"But suppose all the poor folk died," cried Tommy, "what would the rich
folk do? They can sit in carriages, but can't build them, and eat
dinners, but can't cook them." And he got up and went his way. "Poor
folk ought to be very kind to rich folk, for it's hard to be the like
of them," he said to himself as he went along.
THE SWALLOWS.
There were some children in the north looking at the swallows flying
south. "Why are they going away?" the little one asked.
"The summer is over," the elder sister answered, "and if they stayed
here they would be starved and die of cold, and so, when the summer
goes, they journey south."
"Our mother and sisters are in the south," the little one said, as they
looked after the birds. "Dear little swallows, tell mother that we are
watching for her!" But they were already flying over the sea. The
chilly winds tried to follow, but the swallows flew so swiftly they
were not overtaken; they went on, with the summer always before them.
They were tired many a time; once they stayed to rest upon the French
coast, and once, in the Bay of Biscay, they clung to the rigging of a
ship all through the night, but in the morning they went on again.
Far away in the south, two English children were looking from the
turret window of an old castle.
"Here are the swallows," they said; "perhaps they have come from
England. Dear swallows, have you brought us a message?" they asked.
"It was very cold, we had no time for messages; and we must not lose
the track of summer," the swallows twittered, and they flew on till
they reached the African shore.
"Poor little swallows," said the English children, as they watched the
ship come into port that was to take them back to their own land; "they
have to chase the summer and the sun, but we do not mind whether it is
summer or winter, for if we only keep our hearts warm, the rest does
not matter."
"It is very good of the swallows to come to us," the elder sister said,
in the next spring, when she heard their first soft twitter beneath the
eaves, "for the summer is in many places, and we are so far from the
south."
"Yes, it is very good of them to come," the children answered; "dear
little swallows, perhaps they love us!"
A FIRST LOVE-MAKING.
A land there is beyond the sea
That I have never seen,
But Johnny says he'll take me there,
And I shall be a queen.
He'll build for me a palace there,
Its roof will be of thatch,
And it will have a little porch
And everything to match.
And he'll give me a garden-green,
And he'll give me a crown
Of flowers that love the wood and field
And never grow in town.
And we shall be so happy there,
And never, never part,
And I shall be the grandest queen--
The queen of Johnny's heart.
Then, Johnny, man your little boat
To sail across the sea;
There's only room for king and queen--
For Johnny and for me.
And, Johnny dear, I'm not afraid
Of any wind or tide,
For I am always safe, my dear,
If you are by my side.
SMUT.
Now, this story is quite true. Once upon a time there was a cat called
Mr. Puff; he lived in a grand house, quite close to the Turkish
Embassy. A lord and a lady and several servants lived with Mr. Puff; he
was very kind to them, letting them do in all things as they liked, and
never sending them away or keeping the house to himself. One day Mr.
Puff, being out in the rain, found a poor little kitten, covered with
mud, and crying bitterly: so Mr. Puff took the kitten between his
teeth, carried it home, and set it down on the drawing-room hearth-rug.
The lord and the lady had the kitten washed, and gave it food, and
called it Smut. Then Smut went and sat him down on the lord's
writing-table.
When Smut grew to be a cat, but before he was yet a large one, the lord
and the lady thought awhile, and spoke, "We have a dear friend," they
said, "and he is catless; therefore, if Mr. Puff will agree, we will
take Smut to him as a present." And Mr. Puff agreed. So Smut was put
into a birdcage, for there was nothing else to serve him for a
travelling carriage, and taken to the dear friend's house. The dear
friend had a little girl with golden hair, and when she saw Smut, she
cried out for joy, and said, "Never before did I see a dicky-bird with
a furry coat, a long tail, and little white teeth." But Smut shook his
head, as if to say, "I am not a dicky-bird, sweet maid, but only a
four-legged cat;" then they opened the birdcage door, and he walked
out, waving his tail.
Now, when Smut grew up, his gravity and dignity made all who knew his
history wonder, and few could believe that he had once been a dirty
kitten, covered with mud, glad to accept the charity of Mr. Puff. When
a year had gone, or perhaps even a longer time, there was a great war
in Turkey, and terrible battles were fought. Then Smut looked very
anxious, and went quite bald, and his coat fell off in little patches;
but none could tell why. At last he died, and the little girl wept
sorely, and all who had known him grieved and lamented.
And when Smut had been sleeping only a little while beneath the lilac
tree, accident revealed that, instead of a lowly foundling, he had been
of high degree, for the little vagrant Mr. Puff had found was no less a
person than the Turkish Ambassador's coachman's wife's cat's kitten.
SEE-SAW.
Get into the boat and away to the west,
See-saw! see-saw!
For they've cut down the tree with the poor linnet's nest,
See-saw! see-saw!
The bulrushes nod and the water-lilies sigh,
See-saw! see-saw!
And all of us know the sad reason why,
See-saw! see-saw!
For, oh! the tree--the tree's cut down,
And every one of its leaves are brown;
And in the field the children play,
But the little linnet has flown away:
Oh, dear! oh, dear! oh, dear!
THE BAD GIRL.
She was always called the bad girl, for she had once, when she was very
little, put out her tongue at the postman. She lived alone with her
grandmother and her three brothers in the cottage beyond the field, and
the girls in the village took no notice of her. The bad girl did not
mind this, for she was always thinking of the cuckoo clock. The clock
stood in one corner of the cottage, and every hour a door opened at the
top of its face, and a little cuckoo came out and called its name just
the same number of times that the clock ought to have struck, and
called it so loudly and in so much haste that the clock was afraid to
strike at all. The bad girl was always wondering whether it was worse
for the clock to have a cupboard in its forehead, and a bird that was
always hopping in and out, or for the poor cuckoo to spend so much time
in a dark little prison. "If it could only get away to the woods," she
said to herself, "who knows but its voice might grow sweet, and even
life itself might come to it!" She thought of the clock so much that
her grandmother used to say--
"Ah, lassie, if you would only think of me sometimes!" But the bad girl
would answer--
"You are not in prison, granny dear, and you have not even a bee in
your bonnet, let alone a bird in your head. Why should I think of you?"
One day, close by the farm, she saw the big girls from the school
gathering flowers.
"Give me one," she said; "perhaps the cuckoo would like it." But they
all cried, "No, no!" and tried to frighten her away. "They are for the
little one's birthday. To-morrow she will be seven years old," they
said, "and she is to have a crown of flowers and a cake, and all the
afternoon we shall play merry games with her."
"Is she unhappy, that you are taking so much trouble for her?" asked
the bad girl.
"Oh, no; she is very happy: but it will be her birthday, and we want to
make her happier."
"Why?"
"Because we love her," said one;
"Because she is so little," said another;
"Because she is alive," said a third.
"Are all things that live to be loved and cared for?" the bad girl
asked, but they were too busy to listen, so she went on her way
thinking; and it seemed as if all things round--the birds, and bees,
and the rustling leaves, and the little tender wild flowers, half
hidden in the grass--answered, as she went along--
"Yes, they are all to be cared for and made happier, if it be
possible."
"The cuckoo clock is not alive," she thought. "Oh, no; it is not
alive," the trees answered; "but many things that do not live have
voices, and many others are just sign-posts, pointing the way."
"The way! The way to what, and where?"
"We find out for ourselves;--we must all find out for ourselves," the
trees sighed and whispered to each other.
As the bad girl entered the cottage, the cuckoo called out its name
eleven times, but she did not even look up. She walked straight across
to the chair by the fireside, and kneeling down, kissed her granny's
hands.
MORNING TIME.
I.
Awake, my pet!
What! slumbering yet,
When the day's so warm and bright?
The flowers that wept
Before they slept
O'er the darkness of yesternight,
Have listened long
To the lark's wild song,
And awoke with the morning light.
II.
Again and again
Through the window-pane
The jasmine flowers kept peeping,
And in at the door,
And along the floor,
The sunny rays came creeping,
So I opened wide
The sash, and tried
To tell them you were sleeping.
III.
Awake, my dear,
The winter drear
Has fled with all things dreary,
But quickly by
The spring will fly,
And soon the birds will weary.--
Awake while yet
The dew is wet
And day is young, my deary.
THE PINK PARASOL.
The pink parasol had tender whalebone ribs and a slender stick of
cherry-wood. It lived with the wilful child in the white-house, just
beyond the third milestone. All about the trees were green, and the
flowers grew tall; in the pond behind the willows the ducks swam round
and round and dipped their heads beneath the water.
Every bird and bee, every leaf and flower, loved the child and the pink
parasol as they wandered in the garden together, listening to the birds
and seeking the shady spots to rest in, or walking up and down the long
trim pathway in the sunshine. Yet the child tired of it all, and before
the summer was over, was always standing by the gate, watching the
straight white road that stretched across the plain.
"If I might but see the city, with the busy streets and the eager
crowds," he was always saying to himself.
Then all that lived in the garden knew that the child would not be with
them long. At last the day came when he flung down the pink parasol,
and, without even one last look at the garden, ran out at the gate.
The flowers died, and the swallows journeyed south; the trees
stretched higher and higher, to see the child come back across the
plain, but he never came. "Ah, dear child!" they sighed many a time,
"why are you staying? and are your eyes as blue as ever; or have the
sad tears dimmed them? and is your hair golden still? and your voice,
is it like the singing of the birds? And your heart--oh! my dear, my
dear, what is in your heart now, that once was so full of summer and
the sun?"
The pink parasol lay on the pathway, where the child left it, spoilt by
the rain, and splashed by the gravel, faded and forgotten. At last, a
gipsy lad, with dark eyes, a freckled face, and little gold rings in
his ears, came by; he picked up the pink parasol, hid it under his
coat, and carried it to the gipsy tent. There it stayed till one day
the cherry-wood stick was broken into three pieces, and the pink
parasol was put on the fire to make the water boil for the gipsy's
tea.
THE SISTERS.
The little sisters went into the room to play at ball.
"We must be careful not to wake the white cat," the tall one said,
softly.
"Or to spoil the roses," the fat one whispered; "but throw high, dear
sister, or we shall never hit the ceiling."
"You dear children," thought the white cat, "why do you come to play
here at all? Only just round the corner are the shady trees, and the
birds singing on the branches, and the sunshine is flecking the
pathway. Who knows but what, out there, your ball might touch the sky?
Here you will only disturb me, and perhaps spoil the roses; and at best
you can but hit the ceiling!"
THE WHITE RABBITS.
All the white rabbits but two, my dears,
All the white rabbits but two,
Away they all sailed in a cockle-shell boat,
Painted a beautiful blue.
All the white rabbits so snowy and sleek,
Away they went down to the shore;
Little they thought, so happy and meek,
They'd never come up from it more.
Oh, the white rabbits they wept and they sobbed,
Till the boat it shook up in the sails;
Oh, the white rabbits they sobbed and they shook
From their poor loppy ears to their tails.
Away they all sailed to a desolate land
Where never a lettuce-leaf grew,
All the white rabbits but two, my dears,
All the white rabbits but two.
THE WOODEN HORSE.
"Come and have a ride," the big brother said.
"I am afraid," the little one answered; "the horse's mouth is wide
open."
"But it's only wooden. That is the best of a horse that isn't real. If
his mouth is ever so wide open, he cannot shut it. So come," and the
big brother lifted the little one up, and dragged him about.
"Oh, do stop!" the little one cried out in terror; "does the horse make
that noise along the floor?"
"Yes."
"And is it a real noise?"
"Of course it is," the big brother answered.
"But I thought only real things could make real things," the little one
said; "where does the imitation horse end and the real sound begin?"
At this the big brother stood still for a few minutes.
"I was thinking about real and imitation things," he said presently.
"It's very difficult to tell which is which sometimes. You see they get
so close together that the one often grows into the other, and some
imitated things become real and some real ones become imitation as they
go on. But I should say that you are a real coward for not having a
ride."
"No, I am not," the little one laughed; and, getting astride the wooden
horse, he sat up bravely. "Oh, Jack, dear," he said to his brother, "we
will always be glad that we are real boys, or we too might have been
made with mouths we were never able to shut!"
THE DUCK POND.
So little Bridget took the baby on her right arm and a jug in her left
hand, and went to the farm to get the milk. On her way she went by the
garden-gate of a large house that stood close to the farm, and she told
the baby a story:--
"Last summer," she said, "a little girl, bigger than you, for she was
just able to walk, came to stay in that house--she and her father and
mother. All about the road just here, the ducks and the chickens from
the farm, and an old turkey, used to walk about all the day long, but
the poor little ducks were very unhappy, for they had no pond to swim
about in, only that narrow ditch through which the streamlet is
flowing. When the little girl's father saw this, he took a spade, and
worked and worked very hard, and out of the ditch and the streamlet he
made a little pond for the ducks, and they swam about and were very
happy all through the summer days. Every morning I used to stand and
watch, and presently the garden-gate would open, and then the father
would come out, leading the little girl by the hand, and the mother
brought a large plateful of bits of broken bread. The little girl used
to throw the bread to the ducks, and they ran after it and ate it up
quickly, while she laughed out with glee, and the father and the
mother laughed too just as merrily. Baby, the father had blue eyes, and
a voice that you seemed to hear with your heart.
"The little girl used to feed the chickens too, and the foolish old
turkey that was so fond of her it would run after her until she
screamed and was afraid. The dear father and the little girl came out
every morning, while the black pigs looked through the bars of the
farm-yard gate and grunted at them, as if they were glad, and I think
the ducks knew that the father had made the pond, for they swam round
and round it proudly while he watched them, but when he went away they
seemed tired and sad.
"The pond is not there now, baby, for a man came by one day and made it
into a ditch again; and the chickens and the ducks from the farm are
kept in another place.
"The little girl is far away in her own home, which the father made for
her, and the dear father lives in his own home too--in the hearts of
those he loved."
That was the story that Bridget told the baby.
THE LITTLE MAID.
There is a sweet maiden asleep by the sea,
Her lips are as red as a cherry;
The roses are resting upon her brown cheeks--
Her cheeks that are brown as a berry.
She's tired of building up castles of sand,
Her hands they are gritty and grubby;
Her shoes, they are wet, and her legs, they are bare,
Her legs that are sturdy and chubby.
I'll wrap a shawl round you, my dear little maid,
To keep the wind off you completely,
And soft I will sing you a lullaby song,
And soon you will slumber most sweetly.
THE DONKEY ON WHEELS.
There was once a poor little donkey on wheels. It had never wagged its
tail, or tossed its head, or said, "Hee-haw!" or tasted a tender
thistle. It always went about, anywhere that anyone pulled it, on four
wooden wheels, carrying a foolish knight, who wore a large cocked hat
and a long cloak, because he had no legs. Now, a man who has no legs,
and rides a donkey on wheels, has little cause for pride; but the
knight was haughty, and seldom remembered his circumstances. So the
donkey suffered sorely, and in many ways.
One day the donkey and the knight were on the table in front of the
child to whom they both belonged. She was cutting out a little doll's
frock with a large pair of scissors.
"Mistress," said the knight, "this donkey tries my temper. Will you
give me some spurs?"
"Oh, no, sir knight," the child answered. "You would hurt the poor
donkey; besides, you have no heels to put them on."
"Cruel knight!" exclaimed the donkey. "Make him get off, dear mistress;
I will carry him no longer."
"Let him stay," said the child, gently; "he has no legs, and cannot
walk."
"Then why did he want spurs?"
"Just the way of the world, dear donkey; just the way of the world."
"Ah!" sighed the donkey, "some ways are very trying, especially the
world's;" and then it said no more, but thought of the fields it would
never see, and the thistles it would never taste.
COCK-A-DOODLE.
I know a lovely dicky-bird,
A cock-a-doodle-doo;--
My father and my mother
And my sister know it too.
It struts about so gaily,
And it is brave and strong;
And when it crows, it is a crow,
Both very loud and long.
Oh, "Cock-a-doodle-doo," it crows,
And cock-a-doodle won't
Leave off its cock-a-doodling,
When mother dear cries "Don't!"
THE BOY AND LITTLE GREAT LADY.
She was always called the "little great lady," for she lived in a grand
house, and was very rich. He was a strange boy; the little great lady
never knew whence he came, or whither he went. She only saw him when
the snow lay deep upon the ground. Then in the early morning he swept a
pathway to the stable in which she had once kept a white rabbit. When
it was quite finished, she came down the steps in her white dress and
little thin shoes, with bows on them, and walked slowly along the
pathway. It was always swept so dry she might have worn paper shoes
without getting them wet. At the far end he always stood waiting till
she came, and smiled and said, "Thank you, little boy," and passed on.
Then he was no more seen till the next snowy morning, when again he
swept the pathway; and again the little great lady came down the steps
in her dainty shoes, and went on her way to the stable.
But at last, one morning when the snow lay white and thick, and she
came down the steps as usual, there was no pathway. The little boy
stood leaning on a spade, his feet buried deep in the snow.
"Where is your broom? and where is the pathway to the rabbit house?"
she asked.
"The rabbit is dead, and the broom is worn out," he answered; "and I am
tired of making pathways that lead to empty houses."
"But why have you done it so long?" she asked.
"You have bows on your shoes," he said; "and they are so thin you could
not walk over the snow in them--why, you would catch your death of
cold," he added, scornfully.
"What would you do if I wore boots?"
"I should go and learn how to build ships, or paint pictures, or write
books. But I should not think of you so much," he said.
The little great lady answered eagerly, "Go and learn how to do all
those things; I will wait till you come back and tell me what you have
done," and she turned and went into the house.