Tick-Tack! tick-tack! This way, that way, forward, back, Swings the pendulum to and fro, Always regular, always slow. Grave and solemn on the wall,— Hear it whisper! hear it call! Little Ginx knows naught of Time, But has heard the mystic rhyme,— “Hickory, dickory, dock! The mouse ran up the clock!” Tick-tack! tick-tack! White old face with figures black! So when dismal, stormy days Keep him from his out-door plays, Most that he cares for is to sit Watching, always watching it. And when the hour strikes he thinks,— (A dear, wise head has the little Ginx!) “The clock strikes one, The mice ran down!” Tick-tack! tick-tack! This way, that way, forward, back! Though so measured and precise, Ginx believes it full of mice. A mouse runs up at every tick, But when the stroke comes, scampering quick, Mice run down again; so they go, Up and down, and to and fro! Hickory, dickory, dock, Full of mice is the clock!

[THUMB]
[PAGE]

[ DAME FIDGET AND HER SILVER PENNY.]

A Wee,wee woman

Was little old Dame Fidget,

And she lived by herself

In a wee, wee room,

And early every morning,

So tidy was her habit,

She began to sweep it out

With a wee, wee broom.

To sweep for the cinders,

Though never were there any,

She whisked about, and brushed about,

Humming like a bee;

When, odd enough, one day

She found a silver penny,

Shining in a corner,

As bright as bright could be.

She eyed it, she took it Between her thumb and finger; She put it in the sugar bowl And quickly shut the lid; And after planning over carefully The way to spend it, She resolved to go to market And to buy herself a kid.
And that she did next day; but, ah, The kid proved very lazy! And it moved toward home so slowly She could scarcely see it crawl; At first she coaxed and petted it, And then she stormed and scolded, Till at last, when they had reached the bridge, It would not go at all.
Just then Dame Fidget saw a dog run by, And whistled to him, And cried:—“Pray dog bite kid, Kid won’t go! I see by the moonlight ’Tis almost midnight, And time kid and I were home Half an hour ago!”
But no, he said he wouldn’t; So to the stick she pleaded:— “Pray stick beat dog, dog won’t bite kid, Kid won’t go! I see by the moonlight ’Tis almost midnight, And time kid and I were home Half an hour ago!”