Old farmer Jack gazed on his wheat,
And feared the frost would nip it.
Said he, "it's nearly seven feet--
I must begin to strip it."
He stripped it with a stripper and
He bagged it with a bagger;
The bags were all so lumpy that
They made the lumper stagger.
The lumper staggered up the stack
Where he was told to stack it;
And Jack was paid and put the cash
Inside his linen jacket.
OLD BLACK JACKO
Old Black Jacko
Smokes tobacco
In his little pipe of clay.
Puff, puff, puff,
He never has enough
Though he smokes it all day.
But his lubra says, "Mine tink dat Jacky
Him shmoke plenty too much baccy."
BIRD SONG
I detest the Carrion Crow!
(He's a raven, don't you know?)
He's a greedy glutton, also, and a ghoul,
And his sanctimonious caw
Rubs my temper on the raw.
He's a demon, and a most degraded fowl.
I admire the pert Blue-wren
And his dainty little hen--
Though she hasn't got a trace of blue upon her;
But she's pleasing, and she's pretty,
And she sings a cheerful ditty;
While her husband is a gentleman of honour.
I despise the Pallid Cuckoo,
A disreputable "crook" who
Shirks her duties for a lazy life of ease.
I abhor her mournful call,
Which is not a song at all
But a cross between a whimper and a wheeze.
THE SAILOR
I'd like to be a sailor--a sailor bold and bluff--
Calling out, "Ship ahoy!" in manly tones and gruff.
I'd learn to box the compass, and to reef and tack and luff;
I'd sniff and snifff the briny breeze and never get enough.
Perhaps I'd chew tobacco, or an old black pipe I'd puff,
But I wouldn't be a sailor if . . .
The sea was very rough.
Would you?