STORY-POEMS
The Lady of Shalott
The Forsaken Merman
The Legend Beautiful
Abou Ben Adhem
The Sands of Dee
Lochinvar
DAY-DREAMS
Dreams to Sell
The Lost Bower
Echo and the Ferry
Poor Susan’s Dream
Fancy
TWO HOME-COMINGS
1. The Good Woman Made Welcome in Heaven
2. The Soldier Relieved
WHEN KNIGHTS WERE BOLD
Hunting Song
The Riding to the Tournament
VARIOUS
A Red, Red Rose
Blow, Bugle, Blow
West and East
Genseric
Kubla Khan
Something to Remember
Ring Out, Wild Bells
The first edition
PART I
NOTE
The Editor is indebted to the following authors and publishers for leave to reprint copyright poems: Mr W. Graham Robertson and Mr Norman Gale; Messrs Longmans Green & Co. for a poem by Walter Ramal and for a poem from Stevenson’s Child’s Garden of Verse, Messrs Chatto & Windus for an extract from Swinburne’s Songs Before Sunrise and for a poem from Walter Thornbury’s Ballads and Songs, Messrs G. Routledge & Sons for a poem by Joaquin Miller, Mr Elliot Stock for an extract from a play by H. N. Maugham; and Mr John Lane for the Rands, Eugene Field, and Graham Robertson poems, and for two extracts from John Davidson’s Fleet Street Eclogues.
PREFACE
IN compiling a selection of Poetry for Children, a conscientious Editor is bound to find himself confronted with limitations so numerous as to be almost disheartening. For he has to remember that his task is, not to provide simple examples of the whole range of English poetry, but to set up a wicket-gate giving attractive admission to that wide domain, with its woodland glades, its pasture and arable, its walled and scented gardens here and there, and so to its sunlit, and sometimes misty, mountain-tops — all to be more fully explored later by those who are tempted on by the first glimpse. And always he must be proclaiming to the small tourists that there is joy, light and fresh air in that delectable country.
v Briefly, I think that blank verse generally, and the drama as a whole, may very well be left for readers of a riper age. Indeed, I believe that those who can ignore the plays of Shakespeare and his fellow-Elizabethans till they are sixteen will be no losers in the long run. The bulk, too, of seventeenth and eighteenth century poetry, bending under its burden of classical form and crowded classical allusion, requires a completed education and a wide range of reading for its proper appreciation.
Much else also is barred. There are the questions of subject, of archaic language and thought, and of occasional expression, which will occur to everyone. Then there is dialect, and here one has to remember that these poems are intended for use at the very time that a child is painfully acquiring a normal — often quite arbitrary — orthography. Is it fair to that child to hammer into him — perhaps literally — that porridge is spelt porridge, and next minute to present it to him, in an official ‘Reader,’ under the guise of parritch? I think not; and I have accordingly kept as far as possible to the normal, though at some loss of material.
vi In the output of those writers who have deliberately written for children, it is surprising how largely the subject of death is found to bulk. Dead fathers and mothers, dead brothers and sisters, dead uncles and aunts, dead puppies and kittens, dead birds, dead flowers, dead dolls — a compiler of Obituary Verse for the delight of children could make a fine fat volume with little difficulty. I have turned off this mournful tap of tears as far as possible, preferring that children should read of the joy of life, rather than revel in sentimental thrills of imagined bereavement.
There exists, moreover, any quantity of verse for children, which is merely verse and nothing more. It lacks the vital spark of heavenly flame, and is useless to a selector of Poetry. And then there is the whole corpus of verse — most of it of the present day — which is written about children, and this has even more carefully to be avoided. When the time comes that we send our parents to school, it will prove very useful to the compilers of their primers.
vii All these restrictions have necessarily led to two results. First, that this collection is chiefly lyrical — and that, after all, is no bad thing. Lyric verse may not be representative of the whole range of English poetry, but as an introduction to it, as a Wicket-gate, there is no better portal. The second result is, that it is but a small sheaf that these gleanings amount to; but for those children who frankly do not care for poetry it will be more than enough; and for those who love it and delight in it, no ‘selection’ could ever be sufficiently satisfying.
KENNETH GRAHAME.
October 1915.
For the Very Smallest Ones
RHYMES AND JINGLES
We begin with some jingles and old rhymes; for rhymes and jingles must not be despised. They have rhyme, rhythm, melody, and joy; and it is well for beginners to know that these are all elements of poetry, so that they will turn to it with pleasant expectation.
Merry are the Bells
Merry are the bells, and merry would they ring,
Merry was myself, and merry could I sing;
With a merry ding-dong, happy, gay, and free,
And a merry sing-song, happy let us be!
Waddle goes your gait, and hollow are your hose;
Noddle goes your pate, and purple is your nose;
Merry is your sing-song, happy, gay, and free;
With a merry ding-dong, happy let us be!
Merry have we met, and merry have we been;
Merry let us part, and merry meet again;
With our merry sing-song, happy, gay, and free,
With a merry ding-dong, happy let us be!
Safe in Bed
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
Bless the bed that I lie on!
Four corners to my bed,
Five angels there lie spread;
Two at my head,
Two at my feet,
One at my heart, my soul to keep.
Jenny Wren
Jenny Wren fell sick;
Upon a merry time,
In came Robin Redbreast,
And brought her sops of wine.
Eat well of the sop, Jenny,
Drink well of the wine;
Thank you Robin kindly,
You shall be mine.
Jenny she got well,
And stood upon her feet,
And told Robin plainly
She loved him not a bit.
Robin, being angry,
Hopp’d on a twig,
Saying, Out upon you,
Fye upon you,
Bold-faced jig!
Curly Locks
Curly locks! Curly locks!
Thou shalt not wash dishes
Nor yet feed the swine.
But sit on a cushion
And sew a fine seam,
And feed upon strawberries
Sugar and cream.
Pussy-Cat Mew
Pussy-cat Mew jumped over a coal,
And in her best petticoat burnt a great hole.
Pussy-cat Mew shall have no more milk
Till she has mended her gown of silk.
Draw a Pail of Water
Draw a pail of water
For my Lady’s daughter.
Father’s a King,
Mother’s a Queen,
My two little sisters are dressed in green,
Stamping marigolds and parsley.
I Saw a Ship a-sailing
I saw a ship a-sailing,
A-sailing on the sea;
And it was full of pretty things
For baby and for me.
There were sweetmeats in the cabin,
And apples in the hold;
The sails were mad
e of silk,
And the masts were made of gold.
The four-and-twenty sailors
That stood between the decks,
Were four-and-twenty white mice,
With chains about their necks.
The captain was a duck,
With a packet on his back;
And when the ship began to move,
The captain cried, “Quack, quack!”
The Nut-Tree
I had a little nut-tree,
Nothing would it bear
But a silver nutmeg
And a golden pear;
The King of Spain’s daughter
She came to see me,
And all because of my little nut-tree.
I skipped over water,
I danced over sea,
And all the birds in the air couldn’t catch me.
My Maid Mary
My maid Mary she minds the dairy,
While I go a-hoeing and a-mowing each morn;
Gaily run the reel and the little spinning-wheel,
Whilst I am singing and mowing my corn.
The Wind and the Fisherman
When the wind is in the East,
’Tis neither good for man or beast;
When the wind is in the North,
The skilful fisher goes not forth;
When the wind is in the South,
It blows the bait in the fish’s mouth;
When the wind is in the West,
Then ’tis at the very best.
Blow, Wind, Blow
Blow, wind, blow! and go, mill, go!
That the miller may grind his corn;
That the baker may take it and into rolls make it,
And send us some hot in the morn.
All Busy
The cock’s on the house-top,
Blowing his horn;
The bull’s in the barn,
A-threshing of corn;
The maids in the meadows
Are making the hay,
The ducks in the river
Are swimming away.
Winter has Come
Cold and raw
The north wind doth blow
Bleak in the morning early;
All the hills are covered with snow,
And winter’s now come fairly.
Poor Robin
The north wind doth blow,
And we shall have snow,
And what will poor Robin do then, poor thing?
He’ll sit in the barn,
And keep himself warm,
And hide his head under his wing, poor thing!
I have a Little Sister
I have a little sister, they call her Peep, Peep,
She wades the waters, deep, deep, deep;
She climbs the mountains, high, high, high;
Poor little creature, she has but one eye.
(A star.)
In Marble Walls
In marble walls as white as milk,
Lined with a skin as soft as silk,
Within a fountain crystal-clear,
A golden apple doth appear.
No doors there are to this stronghold,
Yet thieves break in and steal the gold.
(An egg.)
FAMILIAR OBJECTS
Here are some poems about things with which we are all quite familiar: the Moon and the Stars that we see through our bedroom window; Pussy purring on the hearthrug, the spotted shell on the mantelpiece.
The Moon
O, look at the moon!
She is shining up there;
O mother, she looks
Like a lamp in the air.
Last week she was smaller,
And shaped like a bow;
But now she’s grown bigger,
And round as an O.
Pretty moon, pretty moon,
How you shine on the door,
And make it all bright
On my nursery floor!
You shine on my playthings,
And show me their place,
And I love to look up
At your pretty bright face.
And there is a star
Close by you, and maybe
That small twinkling star
Is your little baby.
Eliza Lee Follen.
The Star
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky.
When the blazing sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
Then the traveller in the dark
Thanks you for your tiny spark;
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
In the dark blue sky you keep,
And often through my curtains peep,
For you never shut your eye
Till the sun is in the sky.
As your bright and tiny spark
Lights the traveller in the dark,
Though I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
Ann and Jane Taylor.
Kitty
Once there was a little kitty
Whiter than snow;
In a barn she used to frolic,
Long time ago.
In the barn a little mousie
Ran to and fro;
For she heard the kitty coming,
Long time ago.
Two eyes had little kitty,
Black as a sloe;
And they spied the little mousie,
Long time ago.
Four paws had little kitty,
Paws soft as dough,
And they caught the little mousie,
Long time ago.
Nine teeth had little kitty,
All in a row;
And they bit the little mousie,
Long time ago.
When the teeth bit little mousie,
Little mouse cried “Oh!”
But she got away from kitty,
Long time ago.
Mrs E. Prentiss.
Kitty: How to Treat Her
I like little Pussy, her coat is so warm,
And if I don’t hurt her she’ll do me no harm;
So I’ll not pull her tail, nor drive her away,
But Pussy and I very gently will play.
Kitty: what She thinks of Herself
I am the Cat of Cats. I am
The everlasting cat!
Cunning, and old, and sleek as jam,
The everlasting cat!
I hunt the vermin in the night —
The everlasting cat!
For I see best without the light —
The everlasting cat!
W. B. Rands.
The Sea Shell
Sea Shell, Sea Shell,
Sing me a song, O please!
A song of ships and sailor-men,
Of parrots and tropical trees;
Of islands lost in the Spanish Main
Which no man ever may see again,
Of fishes and corals under the waves,
And sea-horses stabled in great green caves —
Sea Shell, Sea Shell,
Sing me a song, O please!
Amy Lowell.
COUNTRY BOYS’ SONGS
The Cuckoo
The cuckoo’s a bonny bird,
She sings as she flies;
She brings us good tidings,
And tells us no lies.
She sucks little birds’ eggs,
To make her voice clear,
And never cries Cuckoo
Till the spring of the year.
The Bird-Scarer’s Song
We’ve ploughed our land, we’ve sown our seed,
We’ve made all neat and gay;
Then take a bit and leave a bit,
Away, birds, away!
Cradl
e Song
Sleep, baby, sleep,
Our cottage vale is deep;
The little lamb is on the green,
With woolly fleece so soft and clean,
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Sleep, baby, sleep,
Down where the woodbines creep;
Be always like the lamb so mild,
A kind and sweet and gentle child,
Sleep, baby, sleep!
GOOD NIGHT!
Little baby, lay your head
On your pretty cradle-bed;
Shut your eye-peeps, now the day
And the light are gone away;
All the clothes are tucked in tight;
Little baby dear, good night.
Yes, my darling, well I know
How the bitter wind doth blow;
And the winter’s snow and rain
Patter on the window-pane:
But they cannot come in here,
To my little baby dear.
For the window shutteth fast,
Till the stormy night is past;
And the curtains warm are spread
Round about her cradle-bed:
So till morning shineth bright
Little baby dear, good night!
Ann and Jane Taylor.
For Those a Little Older
A BUNCH OF LENT LILIES
Here three Poets treat the same flower each from his own distinct and delightful point of view. To the first it appeals as the flower of courage, the brave early comer; to the second it is the early goer, the flower of a too swift departure — though daffodils really bloom for a fairly long time, as flowers go; the third is grateful for an imperishable recollection.