I must, however, make an exception when I say “all” the Toys. There was one who did not utter a word. This was Jack, the curly-headed Sailor-Boy, who was deeply in love with Belinda. He was so unhappy about the matter that he feared to speak of her lest in so doing the thought of his sorrow should make him shed unmanly tears in public.
I will tell you the cause of his grief. He could not make her see how much he loved her. Whenever he came near her she immediately closed her eyes. So that it did not matter what expression he assumed, it was all wasted on Belinda. He worried himself about it very much.
“Is it,” said he to himself, “because she doesn’t happen to see, or because she doesn’t wish to see? How can I make her open her eyes? Shall I speak to her coldly or gently, with mirth or with melancholy, in poetry or in prose?”
“I will be poetical,” he resolved; “I will sing her a song of love. That may induce her to open her eyes.”
Now Jack was only a simple Sailor-Lad; he knew little music and less poetry. A few sea-songs and one or two little ballads, these were all he had to trust to, and he could think of none that seemed suitable to the occasion.
He thought long, and finally remembered the beginning of an old song which, with a little alteration, would, he decided, do very well. So, in a rough but tender voice, he thus sang to his lady-love:—
“Of all the girls I love so well,
There’s none I love like ’Linder;
She is the darling of my heart,—
And Linder rhymes with cinder.”
“This,” he said to himself, “will teach her how deep and how true my love is for her. This should open her eyes.”
But Belinda, quite unmoved, sat with them tightly closed.