I would scamper through the greenhouse, preceded him, or have made no con Chase the cat, And I'd live on sugar-candy. Think of that! It is not given to all children to be philosophers, but every child makes believe, and every child looks bravely into the future, and indulges in generous building schemes. For the best make believe poems, which would constitute a large section of the Grown-up's Anthology, we must go agai to the "Child's Garden;" there the standard is once more set. Look, for example, at the "Land of Story Books:" At evening when the lamp is lit, Around the fire my parents sit; They sit at home and talk and sing, And do not play at anything. Now, with my little gun, I crawl scious attempts to work on similar lines, none impresses and convinces as he. Taking them altogether, the poets have not shown themselves to be closely in touch with children: the great ones have tried and failed, and left it to humbler singers-such as Mary Lambto give us the true note. But these humble singers are few and far between, as the editor of the adult volume will quickly discover. We might cite Mrs. Piatt as cne example of an author who, with a wide, comprehending love for children, has captured in a hundred efforts little of the genius of childhood. Perhaps in all her poems nothing is so characteristic and illuminating as the triumphal boast, in "Child's World Ballads," of the little girl who had visited Edinburgh: I put my hand on every chair That said "Don't touch," at Holyrood. Another good example of an author who wished to produce sympathetic child There, in the night, where none can spy, poems, but has always broken down, is All in my hunter's camp I lie, And play at books that I have read, Till it is time to go to bed. 1 There is a little poem in Mrs. Woods' recent volume, "Aeromancy," of much the same character. Mr. Bret Harte. The "Miss Edith" poems are failures, and though he certainly was visited by inspiration when he began "On the Landing," the mood passed before the piece was completed. Two little boys, Bobby, aged three and a half, and Johnny, a year older, are peeping over the balusters at night when they ought to be in bed, watching the guests on the floor below. Here are the best lines: BOBBY. "Do you know why they've put us in that back room, Up in the attic, close against the sky, Do you know why?" "No more I don't, nor why that Sammy's mother, Could it be, Bobby, something that I dropded? And is that why?" BOBBY. "Good boys behaves, and so they don't get scolded, Nor drop hot milk on folks as they pass by." JOHNNY (piously). "Marbles would bounce on Mr. Jones's bald head, But I shan't try." To this stage the piece is admirable. Then a discordant note is struck. The next remark of Bobby (aged three and a half) is to this effect: "Do you know why Aunt Jane is always snarling At you and me because we tells a lie, That ma thinks horrid, 'cause he bunged But she don't slap that man that called my eye, Eats an ice-cream down there like any other. No more don't I!" BOBBY. "Do you know why nurse says it isn't manners For you and me to ask folks twice for pie, And no one hits that man with two bananas? Do you know why?" JOHNNY. "No more I don't, nor why that girl, whose dress is Off of her shoulders, don't catch cold and die, When you and me gets croup when we undresses! No more don't I!" BOBBY. "Perhaps she ain't as good as you and I is, And God don't want her up there in the sky, her darling? Do you know why?" In his desire to make a point the author transgresses fatally. And in the next stanza the Seventh Commandment is jeopardized, just as in the modern novel, and we throw away the book. Looking forward is a childish amusement akin to making believe. "When I am grown up" is a form of words constantly on the child's tongue: When I am grown to man's estate I shall be very proud and great, And tell the other girls and boys Not to meddle with my toys. So says the child in Mr. Stevenson's book. Elsewhere he descends to particulars, and decides that of all professions his choice would be the lampmust have the lighter's. But you exquisite little poem in full: And lets her live-to come in just when My tea is nearly ready, and the sun has pie is Now Tom would be a driver, and Maria go to sea, And my papa's a banker, and as rich as he can be, But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I'm to do, Oh, Leerie, I'll go round at nights and light the lamps with you. own. But readers of our Grown-up's Anthology will like to have it. It will take them back to old days. I the volume "Poems written for a Child," from the pen of "A," is a very quaint little anecdote in the same kind, entitled "Wooden Legs." A girl and boy are telling each other what they For we are very lucky, with a lamp before would like to be: the door, And Leerie stops to light it, as he lights so many more; And oh, before you hurry by with ladder and with light, Oh, Leerie, see a little child and nod to him to-night. If I had to forget all the poems in the "Child's Garden" and retain but one, I should, I think, choose "The Lamplighter." The last line wanders through the passages of the mind like a gentle musical phrase. In "Poems Written for a Child" (1868), a volume in which the late Menella Bute Smedley, and an anonymous writer known as "A," collaborated, there are some good "Looking forward" verses called "A Boy's Aspirations," from Miss Smedley's pen. Here are three stanzas out of the ten: I was four yesterday, when I'm quite old I'll have a cricket-ball made of pure gold; I'll carve the roast meat, and help soup and fish; I'll get my feet wet whenever I wish. I'll spend a hundred pounds every day; I'll have a rose-tree always in bloom; I'll have no visitors ever let in. These lines are good, although now and then erroneous. The mistakes are due to ignorance of boy-nature. A boy, for example, neither wants a cricket-ball made of gold-it would be against the laws-nor a rose-tree always in bloom. Nor would it strike him as peculiar ecstasy to keep a dancing bear in his mother's room; he would prefer it in his Then he said, "I'll be a soldier, And I'll come home with a wooden leg, This is a new and acceptable ambition, It touched the tangled golden curls, When all the school were leaving. For near her stood the little boy, He saw her lift her eyes, he felt The soft hand's light caressing, And heard the tremble of her voice, As if a fault confessing. "I'm sorry that I spelt the word: It is prettily conceivable; but that kind of thing may well be postponed. Children who love each other in this way are not making the most of their opportunities as privileged barbarians. To the same family belongs Mr. Dobson's "Drama of the Doctor's Window." The best poetical expression of the love of girl and boy that I know is to be found in the two sonnets of George Eliot, called "Brother and Sister," which might well be our sole representatives of this class. Such love is always worship, always based on admiration; it is almost always one-sided. Affection, as we understand it-friendship on equal ground-being a civilized growth, comes later. Children are not of civilization as we are. In this connection I should like to quote the lines entitled "Dry Bread," from Victor Hugo's "L'Art d'être Grandpère," which enshrines for us a charming incident, where the actors are not, to the casual eye at least, girl and boy, but girl and old man. The translation is by the Reverend Henry Carrington: Jeanne to dry bread and the dark room For some misdeed; I, to my duty blind, Another class of poetry, which only the adult should possess, is that which describes particular children. Many poets - Wordsworth pre-eminently have attempted this kind, but, for the most part, so rapt has been their admiring-almost worshipping-gaze, that in the finished poem the child has been only faintly visible through a golden mist. In other cases the poet has made the child a mere peg upon which to hang a thought of his own. But simple, unaffected descriptions do exist. In "Lays for the Nursery" (bound up with "Whistle Binkie," that charming collection of Scotch poems by minor writers) will be found the history of "Wee Joukydaidles," by James Smith, a very human poem wlich, probably unconsciously, Mr. William Canton, the author of "The Invisible Playmate," who has for children a love that sometimes becomes adoration, reduces to a couplet when of a certain notable "Little Woman" he says: She is my pride, my plague, my rest, my rack, my bliss, my bane, Were outraged. Jeanne's soft little voice She brings me sunshine of the heart, and arose "I'll put no more my thumb up to my nose; of old You always take to laughing when we No government can stand; at every hour bound; Yes, by indulgences like oppose, I'm wrong. those, The people's ruin has wrought. softening of the brain. From Mr. Canton's last volume, "W. V., Her Book, and Various Verses," I should take the poems entitled "Wings and Hands" and "Making Pansies." But enough of the Grown-up's Anthology. It is time now to explain whence the contents of the Child's Anthology should be drawn. The names that come most naturally to mind are those of "Lewis Carroll" and Edward Lear; and I would add Dr. Hoffmann, but that it is a mistake to separate his verses and pictures. These twain would yield been always many pages; I need not stop to particularize since every one knows them so well. The "Percy Reliques" would be a rich source; and I should include such modern ballads as "John Gilpin," and a few to be found in the works of one or two of the Ingoldsby Legends, less-known experimentalists. Among these is "A," the lady from whom a quotation has already been made. In Put me upon dry bread." "I'm sure we ought And will." Then Jeanne from her dark corner cries, But low to me, raising her beauteous eyes (Love gives the lion's courage to the lamb!) "And I will go and bring you pots of jam!" Landor's "Rosina" is somewhat akin. pler, "Poems written for a Child," in "Child She cleaned the tent-stitch and the samWorld" and in "Child Nature," are several capital pieces of humorous narrative. There is, for instance, Fred's story in "Child Nature," entitled "John's Sin." It tells of a giant who, since conscience makes cowards of us all, became a cowherd for conscience' sake, but is haulked at the ou set by an inability to milk: He could not milk her; he was skilled In abstruse science; was renown'd In mathematics; he had Mill'd, Bain'd, Maurice'd, Hamilton'd, Brown'd. Herodotus and Mr. Bright and He knew-but could not a milk a cow! (The deleted lines, it may be mentioned in passing, are remarkable for containing a new rhyme to cow. The ingenious "A" presses the author of "The Bothie of Tober na Vuolich" into that service.) While the giant was bemoaning this incapacity, a dwarf came by, milked the cow, boxed the giant's ears, and led him as prisoner to a farm, where his size became a serious embarrassment. Shortly afterwards he died. The author remarks sententiously: A giant in a little room Alive, is an uncommon bore; In the same class are several of the pieces in “Lilliput Levee,” by "Matthew Browne," notably the introductory verses, which tell of the revolution, the "Ballad of Frodgedobbulum's Fancy," "Shockheaded Cicely and the Bears," and "Clean Clara." Frodgedobbulum was A vulgar giant, who wore no gloves, And very pig-headed in his loves! Cleanliness was Clean Clara's passion. She cleaned "a hundred thousand things:" She cleaned the mirror, she cleaned the cupboard. All the books she Indian-rubbered. She cleaned the tapestry, which ampler. was Joseph going down into the pit, And the Shunamite woman with the boy in a fit. There is, of course, fun and fun. I should, for example, omit Hood's comic ballads-"Faithless Sally Brown" and cognate pieces-where I should include Goldsmith's "Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog" and "Madame Blaize," although superficially they are akin. Hood is for the agile adult brain. He crackles rather than ripples, and children want to be rippled. Moreover, punning is a dissolute habit; and of all distressing developments none equals paronomasia in a child. I should also omit nursery rhymes, because, unlike little boys, they should be heard and not seen. Only antiquarians and folklorists should ever read nursery rhymes. A great part of the pleasure with which in after days we greet the nursery rhymes dear to us in the Golden Age (as Mr. Kenneth Grahame calls it), consists in recalling the kind lips by which they were orally transmitted. The voice, the look, the laugh-all hold us again for one rich flashing moment. Among poets who can with knowledge describe for us child life, both subjective and objective, we are fortunate in possessing Mr. James Whitcomb Riley. Mr. Riley is a New Englander, and the boy to whom he introduces us is a New Englander too, speaking the Hoosier dialect, but none the less boy for that. Let Mr. Riley's right to speak for children be found in these two Hoosier stanzas called "Uncle Sidney," it is established there: Sometimes, when I bin bad, An' pa "correcks" me nen, 'Cause Uncle Sidney says, An' takes me up an' smiles"The goodest mens they is ain't good As baddest little childs!" These lines are of course too incendiary |