Brown eyes,
Straight nose;
Dirt pies,
Rumpled clothes;
Torn books,
Spoiled toys;
Arch looks,
Unlike a boy’s;
Little rages,
Obvious arts;
(Three her age is),
Cakes, tarts;
Falling down
Off chairs;
Breaking crown
Down stairs;
Catching flies...
THOU happy, happy elf!
(But stop, first let me kiss away that tear,)
Thou tiny image of myself!
(My love, he ’s poking peas into his ear,)
Thou merry, laughing sprite,
With spirits, feather light,
Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled by sin;
(My dear, the child is swallowing a pin!)
Thou little tricksy Puck!
With antic...
When Letty had scarce passed her third glad year,
And her young, artless words began to flow,
One day we gave the child a colored sphere
Of the wide earth, that she might mark and know,
By tint and outline, all its sea and land.
She patted all the world; old empires peeped
Between her baby fingers; her soft hand
Was welcome at all...
Four Years Old:—A Nursery Song
… “Pien d’ amori,
Pien di canti, e pien di fiori.”—FRUGONI.
Full of little loves of ours,
Full of songs, and full of flowers.
AH, little ranting Johnny,
For ever blithe and bonny,
And singing nonny, nonny,
With hat just thrown upon ye;
Or whistling like the thrushes,...
“O where, and O where
Is my bonnie laddie gone?”
—OLD SONG.
ONE day, as I was going by
That part of Holborn christened High,
I heard a loud and sudden cry
That chilled my very blood;
And lo! from out a dirty alley,
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally,
I saw a crazy woman sally,
Bedaubed with grease and mud...
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...
“One name is Elizabeth.”
—BEN JONSON.
I WILL paint her as I see her.
Ten times have the lilies blown
Since she looked upon the sun.
And her face is lily-clear,
Lily-shaped, and dropped in duty
To the law of its own beauty.
Oval cheeks encolored faintly,
Which a trail of golden hair
Keeps from...
SLEEP breathes at last from out thee,
My little patient boy;
And balmy rest about thee
Smooths off the day’s annoy.
I sit me down, and think
Of all thy winning ways;
Yet almost wish, with sudden shrink,
That I had less to praise.
Thy sidelong pillowed meekness;
Thy thanks to all that aid;...
An Inverary correspondent writes: “Thom gave me the following narrative as to the origin of ‘The Mitherless Bairn’; I quote his own words. ‘When I was livin’ in Aberdeen, I was limpin’ roun’ the house to my garret, when I heard the greetin’ o’ a wean. A lassie was thumpin’ a bairn, when out cam a big dame, bellowin’, “Ye hussie, will ye lick a mitherless bairn!” I hobbled up the stair and...
I Remember, I remember
The house where I was born,
The little window where the sun
Came peeping in at morn.
He never came a wink too soon,
Nor brought too long a day;
But now I often wish the night
Had borne my breath away!
I remember, I remember
The roses, red and white,
The violets, and the lily-cups...
