My garden is most dear to me
From carrot bed to apple tree,
And so my patience sickens
When I behold the chickens
In it and scratching merrily.
Dark gloom grows darker, thickens,
In looking at those chickens.
A certain scientific man
Once called the hen "A feeble bird."
It is, I'm sure, on no such plan
My neighbor's hens are built; the word
"Feeble" to them does not apply.
I wish Professor would stand by
And see those hens make mulching fly.
Or let him watch them as they eat
My cauliflower choice and sweet,
Or gorge themselves on berries fine;
The way they always do with mine.
They run on their destructive feet
From stalk to stalk, from vine to vine,
Or scratch as if they dug a mine.
And so, my neighbor, won't you please,
My cares dispel, my troubles ease,
By keeping all your hens at home?
Soon, soon the very earth will freeze
And then the fowls at large may roam.
So I'll not need the pen of Dickens
To tell my horror of your chickens!
TO MY NEIGHBORS AT HILL CREST
Shall I do dear Sam a wrong
If I write no little song
Telling how he pleases Grace,
Brings the light to Tompie's face,
Shares their play or runs a race,
Merry all about the place?
No: I'd do the duck no wrong
If I failed to make the song.
He'll not care for verse or rhyme.
But this pleasant summer-time
I have seen my little neighbors,
Happy in their kindly labors
Making Sam and others glad,
So I say, "God bless the lad;
Bless the lassie"; and I know
That the love to Sam they show
Makes their own hearts richer, truer;
Makes the sky seem brighter, bluer;
Makes them to us all a joy
(I mean duck, and girl, and boy).
So I'd surely do a wrong
If I did not say in song
To loved Tompie and Miss Grace
(Merry all about the place)
That their duck's important, quite,
With his new-grown feathers white;
But the more important thing
Is their love; of this I sing!
IN THE LIMESTONE VALLEY.
PEN PICTURES OF EARLY DAYS IN WESTERN WISCONSIN.
By S. W. BROWN.
Copyright, 1900, La Crosse, Wisconsin.