But he didn’t care a button for that interesting fact;

All he wanted was to reach those curious urns and take them down.

(Alas! the shelf was several feet above his little crown.)

There came a sudden avalanche, and flat upon the floor

He lay, sprinkled with the ashes of a century or more!

A portion of his grandpa ran in torrents down his neck,

And ’round him all his great-great aunts were lying by the peck.

He had Pilgrim Fathers in his shoes, all trickling ’round his toes;

He had grandmas in his hair, and he had cousins in his nose,

And, worst of all, a fragment of the late lamented Jane