["It was better for a young mother to start her new
chapter unhampered: the less she knew the better it was for
her."--_Mrs. Annie Swan_.]
How do you take a baby up?
What does it like to eat?
Do you put rusks in a feeding cup?
Have you to mince its meat?
Haven't I heard them speak of pap?
Isn't there caudle too?
How do you keep the thing on your lap?
Why are its eyes askew?
Is it a touch of original sin
Causes an infant to squall,
Or trust misplaced in a safety-pin
Lost in the depths of a shawl?
When do you "shorten" a growing child
(_Is_ it so much too long)?
Should legs be lopped or the scalp be filed?
Both in a sense seem wrong.
"Kitchy," I think I have heard them say;
What shall I make it kitch?
"Bo" I believe in a mystic way
Frightens or soothes, but which?
Didn't I see one once reversed,
Patted about the spine?
Is it the way they should all be nursed?
Will it agree with mine?
Surely its gums are strangely bare?
Why does it dribble so?
Will reason dawn in that glassy stare
If I dandle it briskly? OH!!!
Grandmothers! Mothers! or Instinct, you!
Haste with your secret lore!
What, oh what shall I, what shall I do?
Baby has crashed to the floor!
* * * * *
"They adjourned to the Village Hell, where each child was
presented with a parcel of suitable clothing."--_Tonbridge
Free Press_.
Asbestos, no doubt.
* * * * *