A Jolly Jingle-Book | Page 4

to drop
Before you can half
commence."
Nobody! Wicked Sir Nobody!
Playing such tricks on my children
three!
If I but set eyes on you,
You should find what you've lost!--

But that, to my cost,
I never am like to do!
[Illustration: Nobody]
MY GARDEN
I have a little garden
All edged with four-o'clocks;
And some of it
is sunflowers,
And some is hollyhocks.
And all around the border
I've planted little stones--
A lot of round
beach pebbles--
To keep out Rover's bones.
And then, as plain as daylight,
A sign, "Keep off the grass,"
Warns
hens and everybody
That here they shouldn't pass.
But Rover makes his pantry
Right in that garden patch;
And all the
hens and chickens
Think that's the place to scratch.
ANNA BURNHAM BRYANT.
MAMMA'S LITTLE HOUSEMAID

I am mamma's little housemaid, don't you see?
They couldn't get
along so well if it were not for me;
For every Friday morning I take
my little broom,
And sweep and sweep the pretty rugs that lie in
mamma's room. And then I sweep the door-steps off, and do not leave a
crumb, And wipe the dishes, too, and oh, it is the bestest fun!
And
then, when mamma starts to bake, she says that maybe I Can make all
by my very self a cunning little pie.
When I am big enough for school
I think I'll like to go,
But truly I would rather stay at home, you know,

And help my mamma do the work, and bake a little pie,
For
mamma says all little girls, if they would only try,
Can help their
mammas very much with willing hands and feet, By sweeping rugs and
door-steps and keeping porches neat. So I am mamma's housemaid, and
she pays me with a kiss,
And papa, when he comes at night, says,
"Bless me, what is this! How bright and clean the rugs do look!" And
then I laugh and say That my little broom and I work for mamma every
day.
HARRIET CROCKER LEROY.
TOYS
Toys have a bedtime, too.
Oh, but it's really true!
This is what you
should do,--
Just as the sun sinks low,
Off to bed make them go,
Laid in a tidy
row.
There let them rest all night,
Sleep until morning light,
Then wake
when day shines bright.
ALICE VAN LEER CARRICK.
THE BATH
It always has seemed queer to me,
When I give Bess a bath
In our
big, shiny, new, white tub,
She shorter grows by half.

But when I take her out again
She hasn't changed at all.
If you have
doubts of what I say,
Just try it with your doll!
REBECCA DEMING MOORE.
NAP-TIME
Rock-a-bye me! Rock-a-bye me!
I'm just as tired as I can be.
We've
swung and swung as high as the sky,
Then slower, to let the "old cat
die;"
We played we were grasshoppers--hippity-hop
The
grasshoppers go, and they never stop;
And then we played
kangaroo--just look,
The way they do in the picture-book!
And
then--I want to get on your knee!
Rock-a-bye me! Rock-a-bye me!
F. LILEY-YOUNG.
CHUMS
We're chums, and we love it---dear father and I!
He's tall and
grown-up, of course--ever so high!
But _you_ don't mind that, though
you're little as me;
He always stoops down, or you sit on his knee

When you're chums.
We go for long walks--he says, "Now for a hike!"--
With beautiful
talks about things that I like;
Some folks do not care about beetles
and toads
And little green snakes that you find in the roads,
But
we're chums.
Sometimes mother gets into trouble with me;
She tells him about it,
and he says, "I see!"
His arm gets around me, and pretty soon, then,

I'm telling him I'll never do it again,
'Cause we're chums.
We tell all our secrets, and when things go bad
And worry-lines come
in his face, I look glad
And get him a-laughing, and smooth them
away.
He says, "Little Partner, it's your turn today!"
So we're
chums.

A TOUCH OF NATURE
A little maid upon my knee
Sighs wearily, sighs wearily;
"I'm tired
out of dressin' dolls,
And havin' stories read," says she.
"There _is_ a book, if I could see,
I should be happy, _puffickly_!

My mamma keeps it on a shelf--
'But _that_ you cannot have,' says
she!"
"But here's your Old Man of the Sea,
And Jack the Giant!" (Lovingly

I tried the little maid to soothe.)
"The _interestin'_ one," says she,
"Is that high-up one!--seems to me
The fings you want just has to be

Somethin' you hasn't got; and _that's_
The interestin' one!" says
she.
A LESSON IN NATURAL HISTORY
"Now who can tell," the teacher said,
"Who the five members be

(The one who knows may go to the head)
Of the cat family?"
"I guess I know as much as that,"
Cried the youngest child in glee;

"The father cat and the mother cat,
And the baby kittens three!"
PICTURE-BOOK TIME
Whenever the rain-drops come pattering down,
And the garden's too
dripping for play,
Whenever poor nursie's determined to frown,
Or
mother dear's just gone away,
Then up to the nursery book-shelves
we climb,
For trouble time's always a picture-book time!
When some one's been naughty, and some one is sad,
When the new
walking