If you would hear
Our elfin mirth
To Mother Earth
Lay down your ear.
A-many have come with their bright eyes clear,
And their young hearts pure, but—alas! Oh dear!
They've made a mistake in the day of the year.
Piccaninnies
I.
CHRISTMAS TREE. (Pohutukawa).
ong ago the Piccaninnies didn't have a rag to their backs except a huia feather which they wore in their hair. They were the jolliest, tubbiest, brownest babies you ever saw with tiny nubbly knobs on their shoulders, as if they had started to grow wings and then changed their minds about it, and little furry pointed ears, as all wild creatures have. Only these were not wild, but very, very shy.