In merest prudence men should teach That cats mellifluous in speech

Are painful contradictions;

That science ranks as monstrous things Two pairs of upper limbs; so wingsE'en angels' wings!—are fictions;

That there's no giant now but Steam; That life, although "an empty dream," Is scarce a "land of Fairy."

"Of course I said all this?" Why, no; i did a thing far wiser, though,—— I read the tale with Mary.

To A CHILD

TO A CHILD

(FROM THE "GARLAND OF RACHEL")

HOW shall I sing you, Child, for whom

So many lyres are strung;

Or how the only tone assume
That fits a Maid so young?

What rocks there are on either hand!
Suppose 'tis on the cards-

You should grow up with quite a grand
Platonic hate for bards!

How shall I then be shamed, undone,
For ah! with what a scorn

Your eyes must greet that luckless One
Who rhymed you, newly born,—

Who o'er your "helpless cradle" bent,
His idle verse to turn;

And twanged his tiresome instrument
Above your unconcern!

Nay, let my words be so discreet,
That, keeping Chance in view,
Whatever after fate you meet

A part may still be true.

Let others wish you mere good looks,—
Your sex is always fair;

Or to be writ in Fortune's books,-
She's rich who has to spare:

I wish you but a heart that's kind,
A head that's sound and clear;
(Yet let the heart be not too blind,
The head not too severe !)

A joy of life, a frank delight;
A not-too-large desire;

And if you fail to find a Knight-
At least... a trusty Squire.

HOUSEHOLD ART

"M

HOUSEHOLD ART

INE be a cot," for the hours of play,

Of the kind that is built by Miss GREEN-
AWAY;

Where the walls are low, and the roofs are red,
And the birds are gay in the blue o'erhead;
And the dear little figures, in frocks and frills,
Go roaming about at their own sweet wills,
And "play with the pups," and "reprove the
calves,"

And do nought in the world (but Work) by halves,
From "Hunt the Slipper" and "Riddle-me-ree"
To watching the cat in the apple-tree.

O Art of the Household!

Men may prate

Of their ways "intense" and Italianate,—

They may soar on their wings of sense, and float To the au delà and the dim remote,

Till the last sun sink in the last-lit West,

'Tis the Art at the Door that will please the best ; To the end of Time 'twill be still the same,

For the Earth first laughed when the children

came!

THE DISTRESSED POET

A SUGGESTION FROM HOGARTH

NE knows the scene so well,—a touch,

ONE

A word, brings back again

That room, not garnished overmuch,
In gusty Drury Lane;

The empty safe, the child that cries,
The kittens on the coat,

The good-wife with her patient eyes,
The milkmaid's tuneless throat;

And last, in that mute woe sublime,
The luckless verseman's air:

The "Bysshe," the foolscap and the rhyme,-
The Rhyme . . . that is not there!

Poor Bard! to dream the verse inspired— With dews Castalian wet

Is built from cold abstractions squired