THE TALE OF A VERY BAD BOY.
Oh! this is the tale of a very bad boy;
He had done all he could other folks to annoy;
Then what do you think there was found to employ
The very bad wits of this very bad boy?
On the night before Christmas, St. Nick to decoy,
Two stockings were hung by the very bad boy,
Who said to himself, "Of the sweet Christmas joy
To double my share, a trick I'll employ;
I'll watch for St. Nick—and the fun I'll enjoy—
I'll give him these stockings his time to employ;
And while he's at work," said the very bad boy,
"I'll hook from his pack just the handsomest toy."
But somehow the fun had a bit of alloy;
St. Nick got a peep at the very bad boy;
He whipped up his steeds, and he cried out, "Ahoy!
You'll get, my young lad, neither candy nor toy."
Then away went St. Nick, and he chuckled with joy,
And he left not a thing for the very bad boy.
[SAM JENKINS'S DREAM.]
A New-Year's Story.
BY ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH.
"I just wish there wasn't any New-Year."
It was a boy—Sam Jenkins—who spoke, the time New-Year's Eve, the place Madison Avenue and Sixty-ninth Street. And what a night it was! and what a day it had been! Snow and slush all day long, and now the wind was blowing a gale across the Harlem flats, and the slush was freezing on the sidewalk, and there was not a star to be seen in all the sky.
Sam was a District Messenger boy, and had been on duty all day and all the evening, and this final call at nine o'clock, when his legs were tired, was the last ounce that broke the camel's back.