BALLADE FOR BELIEVERS IN FAIRIES
All dressed up in our best we ride ...
From Adam’s Square and Harvard too
And read the ads there for our guide
To see what other people do;
Or if a paper we glance through,
At night time, when our curls we comb
This lonesome thought our souls imbue
“Have you a fairy in your home?”
Or when the little folks decide
To play a game of house, or two,
And roles amongst them they divide ...
John is papa, and mama’s Sue ...
Alas the parts are far too few
And those left out in anguish foam
Till someone brings this thought anew
“Have you a fairy in your home?”
A poor stern father has denied
To sweet sixteen a dress that’s new,
And sweet sixteen has vainly tried
And valiantly her suit to sue ...
She sees her older dress must do
Then finds it in a fashion tome
Some thoughtful fairy brought to view ...
“Have you a fairy in your home?”
L’Envoi
O, Pollyanna, here’s to you—
I’ll greet you, if you chance to roam
My way, and ask when I am blue
“Have you a fairy in your home?”
THE JUSTIFICATION AND REVENGE OF GOBBLE-ME-UP
(A Story for Children with Appetites, and for Children Who Do Not Eat.)
Once upon a time, in the days of long ago, when ogres and giants were as plentiful as policemen, and when the ocean was dotted with desert islands, there lived a Giant whose name was Gobble-me-up. As you may have guessed, he lived on one of these islands. All about him stretched ocean, and ocean, and more and more waves; but they didn’t bother him at all. He just lived there alone, and was very happy.
He was a great, large, burly giant, who would have stood over six feet tall in his stocking feet, if he had worn stockings. He had round red cheeks, and dancing blue eyes, and his hair curled itself up into “irrepressible locks” just like your favorite hero’s. He was comfortably fat, and when he laughed he shook all over, just the way the dessert that we have on Sunday does.
As I said, he was a very happy giant indeed, and he used to laugh and shake all over a very great deal. You see, he never realized that he was all alone on his island, because he had never known what it would be like to have someone there to play with him. Every morning when he had finished his rhubarb, he used to walk along the seashore, dabbling his toes in the soapy waves, and singing:
“Gobble-me-up is my name,
A Happy Giant am I ...
And I always feel just the same ...
And I’ll sing this song till I die.”
When he came to this point he would always whirl about on his left heel three times, and clap his hands above his head.
Now at the particular moment when my story would be beginning if I hadn’t wasted all this time talking, Gobble-me-up was just setting out for his morning walk. He was tossing his head in the breeze ... it was the first day of Spring, you see ... and he breathed in the ozone, and enjoyed it, because he didn’t know that it was ozone. And, according to his habit, he began to sing:
“Gobble-me-up is my name....”
when all of a sudden three clams that were lying on the beach opened their shells very wide, and laughed, in perfect rhythm:
“Ha! HA!! HA!!!”
Gobble-me-up looked about in surprise, and the clams continued to laugh in a way that was rude, even for clams.
Then Gobble-me-up became very angry ... no self-respecting Giant likes to be laughed at. He shook his curls at them, trying to look very fierce indeed. At last he sputtered:
“WHAT do you
Mean
By
Talking to
ME
Like that?”
(He was so angry, you see, that he leaped into free verse, a thing which had always been against his principles.)
When the clams had laughed until they could laugh no more, and had rolled over in the sand to wipe the perspiration off their shells, the most imposing clam answered him.
“Ha! ha!” she said (I am quite sure it was a “she”), “the idea of a giant who only eats rhubarb ... he! he! ... the idea of his being called Gobble-me-up!”
At this all the other clams went off into wild gales of laughter, and snapped their shells to show how very funny they thought it was.
Gobble-me-up was perplexed. He didn’t quite know what they meant. But they did not intend to leave him in any doubt about this. They explained immediately, interrupting each other, and acting in a way that was very rude indeed.
They said that he ought to be a “very-cannibal-and-wear-a-red-sash-and-whiskers-and-eat-up-little-boys-and-girls” (they said it quickly, like that) and that he ought to go around muttering dreadful things like:
“Fe, fi, fo, fum,
I smell the blood of an Englishmun,”
instead of reciting his silly little rhymes. They said that he should flourish a tomahawk, and dye his hair black, or at least train it to stand up on end. In fact they abused him horribly, telling him that he was ruining the time-honored reputation of the race of Giants. Any Giant, they said, to be worthy of the name, should endeavor to represent all the Giants on every occasion. He, they said, was an unsatisfactory specimen, and therefore deserved to be squelched most effectively. This they felt to be their duty, and unpleasant though it was, it had to be done.
After this last remark, they sighed sadly, and retired into their shells.
From that moment on, Gobble-me-up was a changed giant. He hardly ever laughed, and when he sang his little song he put it in a minor key, which shows how very sad he was. Every morning he spoiled his rhubarb by weeping salty tears into it.
He felt that he really must do something.
He sat down on a log to think about it. He turned his toes inward so that they might console each other. He dug his elbows hard into his knees, and held his forehead in his hands. Then he said to himself:
“The clams win out,
Without a doubt,
I’ve simply ruined my rep ...
I must fix this,
Or else, I wis,
I’ll have to get some pep.”
This last thought seemed to appeal to him a great deal, even though the rhyme wasn’t very good.
But as he pondered it, he had a more awful thought. How could he act like a blood-thirsty Giant, and go about killing men, when he was the only creature that was anything like a man on the island?
It was a most disturbing idea, and for three days it bothered him. He grew paler, and proportionately thinner. He did not weep into his rhubarb now, but left it strictly alone.
And then he found a solution, and worked it out in a manner truly worthy of a Giant. This was what he did:
One night, when the moon was hidden and the stars were yawning and dropping off to sleep, one by one, he crept out along the beach. Without a sound, he crept up behind the three sleeping clams. Stealthily he reached out his left hand, took the youngest by its little neck and squashed it. Noiselessly he stretched out his right hand, and grasped the second one. And with a maddened shriek of triumph he grabbed up the last clam, before it could snap its shell at him.
With an exalted countenance, he pranced up and down the beach, shouting his paean of victory, so that the stars stopped blinking, and the moon peered around the corner of a cloud to listen:
“Gobble-me-up is my name,
A Fearsome Giant am I,
I’ve a dreadful awesome fame,
Which nobody can deny...!
Gobble-me-up is my name,
No Giant is madder than I ...
Ha! Ha!! Ha! Ha!!
No Giant is madder than I!”
Whereupon he sat down on his log, and, one by one he ate the clams.
It didn’t matter at all that he had indigestion the next day. He knew that he really was an honest-to-goodness Giant, and the thought made him laugh and shake all over, just as he used to do in the good old days, before the clams had tried to disillusion him.