Squeaked, like some battered little rubber toy
Just clean worn out.—And that's just what it was!
And—nights,—the cry of the mother-fox for her young
Was heard, with awe, for long weeks afterward.
And we boys, every night, would go to the door
And, peering out in the darkness, listening,
Could hear the poor fox in the black bleak woods
Still calling for her little ones in vain.
As, all mutely, we returned to the warm fireside,
Mother would say: "How would you like for me