PREFACE.
Merry nephews, merry nieces,
Merry cousins all,
Merry aunts, with merry faces.
Merry uncles, take your places
Round the merry hall.
Here’s a book of merry jingles,
Made for merry times;
Merry here with Merry mingles,
Merry groups, and Merrys single,
"Merry’s Book of Rhymes."
Aunt Sue glowing, Fleta flashing,
Uncle Joe in smiles,
Mattie warbling, Buckeye dashing,
Older crowing, Hatchet slashing,
Each in his own style.
Merry nephs and nieces, meeting
Wheresoe’er you may,
Robert Merry sendeth greeting,
Hoping he may have a seat in
All your merry play.
When in merry circles chatting
Round the merry hearth,
Merry wit with wit combatting,
Merry’s Rhymes will come quite pat in
To help on the mirth.
THE NEST BUILDERS.
Oh! beautiful, beautiful things!
How they range at will through the sky!
Dear Mary, if I could have wings,
Oh! wouldn’t I, wouldn’t I fly?
I would float far away on the cloud,
All vailed in the silver mist;
And perhaps I should feel so proud,
I shouldn’t come back to be kissed.
But see, sis, the sweet little creatures
Have each a straw in his beak;
A lesson of duty to teach us,
As plainly as birds can speak.
We think they are only playing,
As they roam to and fro in the sky;
But these busy fellows are saying,
"’Tis not all for pleasure we fly.
"We’re building a snug little nest
In the crotch of the old elm-tree
We mean it for one of the best,
And busy enough are we.
"We would not live only for play;
And when for a song we take leisure,
We would show, in our caroling way,
How duty is wedded to pleasure."
KINDNESS.
A rose was faint, and hung its head,
One sultry summer’s day,
When a Zephyr kindly fann’d its cheek,
Then sped upon its way.
That Zephyr now, where’er it roams,
Delicious perfume brings.
So kindness gathers, as it goes,
A fragrance for its wings.
Aunt Sue.
