THE CRICKET'S SONG
When all around from out the ground
The little flowers are peeping,
And from the hills the merry rills
With vernal songs are leaping,
I sing my song the whole day long
In woodland, hedge, and thicket—
And sing it, too, the whole night through,
For I 'm a merry cricket.
The children hear my chirrup clear
As, in the woodland straying,
They gather flow'rs through summer hours—
And then I hear them saying:
"Sing, sing away the livelong day,
Glad songster of the thicket—
With your shrill mirth you gladden earth,
You merry little cricket!"
When summer goes, and Christmas snows
Are from the north returning,
I quit my lair and hasten where
The old yule-log is burning.
And where at night the ruddy light
Of that old log is flinging
A genial joy o'er girl and boy,
There I resume my singing.
And, when they hear my chirrup clear,
The children stop their playing—
With eager feet they haste to greet
My welcome music, saying:
"The little thing has come to sing
Of woodland, hedge, and thicket—
Of summer day and lambs at play—
Oh, how we love the cricket!"
"This merry little song always seemed to please everybody except the gnat. The fairies appeared to regard the gnat as a pestiferous insect, but a contemptuous pity led them to call upon him for a recitation, which invariably was in the following strain:
THE FATE OF THE FLIMFLAM
A flimflam flopped from a fillamaloo,
Where the pollywog pinkled so pale,
And the pipkin piped a petulant "pooh"
To the garrulous gawp of the gale.
"Oh, woe to the swap of the sweeping swipe
That booms on the hobbling bay!"
Snickered the snark to the snoozing snipe
That lurked where the lamprey lay.
The gluglug glinked in the glimmering gloam,
Where the buzbuz bumbled his bee—
When the flimflam flitted, all flecked with foam,
From the sozzling and succulent sea.
"Oh, swither the swipe, with its sweltering sweep!"
She swore as she swayed in a swoon,
And a doleful dank dumped over the deep,
To the lay of the limpid loon!
"This was simply horrid, as you all will allow. The queen and her fairy followers were much relieved when the honest katydid narrated a pleasant moral in the form of a ballad to this effect: