Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,
That is known as the Children’s Hour.
I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.
From my study I see in the lamplight,
...
When the lessons and tasks are all ended,
And the school for the day is dismissed,
The little ones gather around me,
To bid me good night and be kissed:
Oh, the little white arms that encircle
My neck in their tender embrace!
Oh, the smiles that are halos of heaven,
Shedding sunshine of love on my face!
And when they are...
Children are what the mothers are.
No fondest father’s fondest care
Can fashion so the infant heart
As those creative beams that dart,
With all their hopes and fears, upon
The cradle of a sleeping son.
His startled eyes with wonder see
A father near him on his knee,
Who wishes all the while to trace
The mother in his...
Down the dimpled greensward dancing,
Bursts a flaxen-headed bevy,—
Bud-lipt boys and girls advancing,
Love’s irregular little levy.
Rows of liquid eyes in laughter,
How they glimmer, how they quiver!
Sparkling one another after,
Like bright ripples on a river.
Tipsy band of rubious faces,
Flushed with Joy’s...
From the German by James Freeman Clarke
THE BELLS of the churches are ringing,—
Papa and mamma have both gone,—
And three little children sit singing
Together this still Sunday morn.
While the bells toll away in the steeple,
Though too small to sit still in a pew,
These busy religious small people
Determine to have their...
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little frosty Eskimo,
Little Turk or Japanee,
O! don’t you wish that you were me?
You have seen the scarlet trees
And the lions over seas;
You have eaten ostrich eggs,
And turned the turtles off their legs.
Such a life is very fine,
But it ’s not so nice as mine:
You must often, as...
Three children sliding on the ice
Upon a summer’s day,
As it fell out they all fell in,
The rest they ran away.
Now, had these children been at home,
Or sliding on dry ground,
Ten thousand pounds to one penny
They had not all been drowned.
You parents all that children have,
And you too that have none,...
When the lessons and tasks are all ended,
And the school for the day is dismissed,
And the little ones gather around me,
To bid me good night and be kissed;
O the little white arms that encircle
My neck in their tender embrace!
O the smiles that are halos of heaven,
Shedding sunshine of love on my face!
And when they are...
When the black-lettered list to the gods was presented
(The list of what Fate for each mortal intends),
At the long string of ills a kind goddess relented,
And slipped in three blessings,—wife, children, and friends.
In vain surly Pluto maintained he was cheated,
For justice divine could not compass its ends;
The scheme of man’s penance...
Each day, when the glow of sunset
Fades in the western sky,
And the wee ones, tired of playing,
Go tripping lightly by,
I steal away from my husband,
Asleep in his easy-chair,
And watch from the open door-way
Their faces fresh and fair.
Alone in the dear old homestead
That once was full of life,
Ringing...
