When the day is nearly over, and the shadows are all gray,
There’s a place in father’s garden where I dearly love to stay;
For I’m tired of all my lessons, and I’m weary of my play,
When the day is nearly over, and the shadows are all gray.
There’s a motherly old willow growing close against the wall,
And I climb up in her branches, and I know I cannot fall,
For she rocks me very softly, in her gentle, loving way,
When the day is nearly over, and the shadows are all gray.
Softly to her leaves and branches come the breezes of the night
And they sing me songs of slumber, in the dim and restful light;
“Sleep and slumber, sleep and slumber, little child,” they seem to say,
“For the day is nearly over, and the shadows are all gray.”
THE FAIRY’S NAME WAS WHISPER
The fairy’s name was Whisper, and she flew around at night;
She filled the lamps of evening, and she set the grasses right;
She waked a lazy glow-worm, where the mossy wood-spring drips,
And hushed the noisy froggies, with her finger on her lips.
“It’s time to sleep! It’s time to sleep!” she told the forest birds;
She soothed the hurried river, with a chant of magic words;
And, finding Billy Beaver, who had planned to work at night,
She sent him off to bed at once, by winking fire-fly light.
The fairy’s name was Whisper; and this I know is true;
And when she’d hung the mists out, there were other things to do;
She caught her robes about her, and she flew from door to door,
To set the babies sleeping, in a hundred homes or more.