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CALLING A BOY IN THE MORNING.
Calling a boy up in the morning can hardly be classed under the head of "pastimes," especially if the boy is fond of exercise the day before. And it is a little singular that the next hardest thing to getting a boy out of bed is getting him into it. There is rarely a mother who is a success at rousing a boy. All mothers know this; so do their boys. And yet the mother seems to go at it in the right way. She opens the stair door and insinuatingly observes, "Johnny.", There is no response. "Johnn_y_." Still no response. Then there is a short, sharp, "John," followed a moment later by a long and emphatic "John Henry." A grunt from the upper regions signifies that an impression has been made; and the mother is encouraged to add, "You'd better be getting down here to your breakfast, young man, before I come up there, an' give you something you'll feel." This so startles the young man that he immediately goes to sleep again; and the operation has to be repeated several times. A father knows nothing about this trouble. He merely opens his mouth as a soda-water bottle ejects its cork, and the "JOHN HENRY" that cleaves the air of that stairway goes into that boy like electricity, and pierces the deepest recesses of his nature, and he pops out of that bed, and into his clothes, and down the stairs, with a promptness that is commendable. It is rarely a boy allows himself to disregard the paternal summons. About once a year is believed to be as often as is consistent with the rules of health. He saves his father a great many steps by his thoughtfulness.
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AN ORDER FOR A PICTURE.
O good painter, tell me true,
Has your hand the cunning to draw
Shapes of things that you never saw?
Aye? Well, here is an order for you.
Woods and cornfields a little brown,—
The picture must not be over bright,—
Yet all in the golden and gracious light
Of a cloud when the summer sun is down.
Alway and alway, night and morn,
Woods upon woods, with fields of corn
Lying between them, not quite sere,
And not in the full, thick, leafy bloom,
When the wind can hardly find breathing room
Under their tassels,—cattle near,
Biting shorter the short green grass,
And a hedge of sumach and sassafras,
With bluebirds twittering all around,—
Ah, good painter, you can't paint sound!
These and the little house where I was born,
Low, and little, and black, and old,
With children, many as it can hold,
All at the windows, open wide,—
Heads and shoulders clear outside,
And fair young faces all ablush;
Perhaps you may have seen, some day,
Roses crowding the self-same way,
Out of a wilding, way-side bush.
Listen closer. When you have done
With woods and cornfields and grazing herds;
A lady, the loveliest ever the sun
Looked down upon, you must paint for me;
Oh, if I only could make you see
The clear blue eyes, the tender smile,
The sovereign sweetness, the gentle grace,
The woman's soul and the angel's face
That are beaming on me all the while!
I need not speak these foolish words;
Yet one word tells you all I would say,—
She is my mother: you will agree
That all the rest may be thrown away.