will take delight
In welcoming me, as I look so bright
In my new and beautiful dress.
But some I shall pass with a scornful glance,
Some, with an elegant nonchalance;
And others will woo me, till I advance
To give them a slight caress."

"Ha, ha!" said the Pin, "you are just the one
Through which I'm commissioned, at once, to run
From back to breast, till, your fluttering done,
Your form may be fairly shown.
And when my point shall have reached your heart,
'T will be as a balm to the wounded part,
To think how you're to be copied by art,
And your beauty will all be known!"

The Stricken Bird

Here's the last food your poor mother can bring!
Take it, my suffering brood.
Oh! they have stricken me under the wing;
See, it is dripping with blood!

Fair was the morn, and I wished them to rise,
Enjoying its beauties with me.
The air was all fragrance—all splendor the skies,
While bright shone the earth and the sea.

Little I thought, when so freely I went,
Employing my earliest breath,
To wake them with song, it could be their intent
To pay me with arrows and death!

Fear that my nestlings would feel them forgot,
Helped me a moment to fly;
Else I had given up life on the spot,
Under my murderer's eye.

Yet, I can never brood o'er you again,
Closing you under my breast!
Its coldness would chill you; my blood would but stain
And spoil the warm down of your nest.

Ere the night-coming, your mother will lie,
All motionless, under the tree;
Where, deafened, and silent, I still shall be nigh,
While you will be moaning for me!

The Young Sportsman

Harry had a dog and gun;
And he loved to set the one,
Barking, out upon the run,
While he held the other,
Often charged so heavily,
'Twas a dangerous thing to be
With so young a wight as he
Mindless of his mother.

Earnestly she warned her child
To forego a sport so wild;
While he, turning, frowned or smiled,
And away would sidle.
For, to give him short and long,
Harry had a head so strong,
In the right or in the wrong,
It was hard to bridle.

On his gunning madly bent,
Often in his clothes a rent
Told the reckless way he went,
Over hedge and brambles.
Homeward then would Harry slouch,
With his gun and empty pouch,
Looking like a scaramouch
Coming from his rambles.

Sometimes when he scaled a wall,
Headlong there to pitch and fall,
Ratling stones, and gun and all.
Down together tumbled.
Tray would bark to tell the news
Of his master with a bruise,
Hatless, and with grated shoes,
Lying flat and humbled!

Where he saw the bushes stirred,
Harry, sure of hare or bird,
Drew,—and at a flash was heard
Noise like little thunder.
When he ran his game to find,
Disappointment 'mazed his mind;—
Finding he'd but shot the wind,
Dumb he stood with wonder!

Over muddy pool or bog,
Not so nimble as his dog,
When he walked the plank or log,
There his balance losing,
Splash! he went—a rueful plight!
If his face before was white,
'Twas like morning turned to night,
Much against his choosing.

Now, like many a hasty one,
Whether quadruped or gun,
Or a mother's wayward son
Given to disaster,
Harry's gun was rather quick;
And it had a naughty trick,—
It would snap itself, and kick
Fiercely at its master.

So, this snappish habit grew
With a power for him to rue;
Just as all bad habits do
Grow, as age increases.
When, one day, with noise and smoke,
Over-charged, the barrel broke,
Harry's hand the mischief spoke—
It was blown to pieces!

Tray came crouching round, and growled,—
Saw the gore, and whined, and howled,
While his owner groaned and scowled,
And the blood was running.
With the horrors of his state,
And with anguish desperate,
Then poor Harry owned too late,
He was sick of gunning!

While his mother bent to mourn
As her froward son was borne,
With his hand all burnt and torn,
Faint and pale, before her,
Harry's pain must be endured,—
And the wound—it might be cured;
But, for fingers uninsured,
There was no restorer!

The Pebble and the Acorn

"I am a Pebble! I yield to none!"
Were the swelling words of a tiny stone,
"Nor time nor season can alter me;
I am abiding, while ages flee.
The pelting hail and the drizzling rain
Have tried to soften me, long, in vain;
And the dew has tenderly sought to melt,
Or touch my heart; but it was not felt.
There's none to tell you about my birth,
For I am as old as the big, round earth.
The children of men arise, and pass
Out of the world, like blades of grass;
And many foot that on me has trod
Is gone from sight, and under the sod!
I am a Pebble! but who art thou,
Rattling along from the restless bough?"

The Acorn was shocked at this rude salute,
And lay for a moment abashed and mute:
She never before had been so near
This gravelly ball, the mundane sphere;
And she felt for a time at loss to know
How to answer a thing so coarse and low.
But to give reproof of a nobler sort
Than the angry look, or the keen retort,
At length she said, in a gentle tone,
"Since it has happened that I am thrown,
From the lighter element where I grew,
Down to another, so hard and new,
And beside a personage so august,
Abased, I'll cover my head with dust,
And quick retire from the sight of one
Whom time, nor season, nor storm, nor sun,
Nor the gentle dew, nor the grinding heel
Has ever subdued, or made to feel!"
And soon in the earth she sank away
From the cheerless spot where the Pebble lay.

But 'twas not long ere the soil was broke
By the jeering head of an infant oak!
As it arose, and its branches spread,
The Pebble looked up, and, wondering, said,
"Ah, modest Acorn! never to tell
What was enclosed in its simple shell;—
That the pride of the forest was folded up
In the narrow space of its little cup!—
And meekly to sink in the darksome earth,
Which proves that nothing could hide her worth!
And O, how many will tread on me,
To come and admire the beautiful tree,
Whose head is towering towards the sky,
Above such a worthless thing as I!
Useless and vain, a cumberer here,
Have I been idling from year to