Don't Kill the Birds

Don't kill the birds, the pretty birds,
That sing about your door,
Soon as the joyous spring has come,
And chilling storms are o'er.
The little birds, how sweet they sing!
Oh! let them joyous live;
And never seek to take the life
That you can never give.
Don't kill the birds, the pretty birds,
That play among the trees;
'Twould make the earth a cheerless place,
Should we dispense with these.
The little birds, how fond they play!
Do not disturb their sport;
But let them warble forth their songs,
Till winter cuts them short.
Don't kill the birds, the happy birds,
That bless the fields and grove;
So innocent to look upon,
They claim our warmest love.
The happy birds, the tuneful birds,
How pleasant 'tis to see!
No spot can be a cheerless place
Where'er their presence be.
D.C. Colesworthy.

Bill's in the Legislature

I've got a letter, parson, from my son away out West,
An' my old heart is heavy as an anvil in my breast,
To think the boy whose future I had once so nicely planned
Should wander from the right and come to such a bitter end.
I told him when he left us, only three short years ago,
He'd find himself a-plowing in a mighty crooked row;
He'd miss his father's counsel and his mother's prayers, too,
But he said the farm was hateful, an' he guessed he'd have to go.
I know there's big temptations for a youngster in the West,
But I believed our Billy had the courage to resist;
An' when he left I warned him of the ever waitin' snares
That lie like hidden serpents in life's pathway everywheres.
But Bill, he promised faithful to be careful, an' allowed
That he'd build a reputation that'd make us mighty proud.
But it seems as how my counsel sort o' faded from his mind,
And now he's got in trouble of the very worstest kind!
His letters came so seldom that I somehow sort o' knowed
That Billy was a-trampin' of a mighty rocky road;
But never once imagined he would bow my head in shame,
And in the dust would woller his old daddy's honored name.
He writes from out in Denver, an' the story's mighty short—
I jess can't tell his mother!—It'll crush her poor old heart!
An' so I reckoned, parson, you might break the news to her—
Bill's in the Legislature but he doesn't say what fur!

The Bridge Builder

An old man going a lone highway,
Came, at the evening cold and gray,
To a chasm vast and deep and wide,
The old man crossed in the twilight dim,
The sullen stream had no fear for him;
But he turned when safe on the other side
And built a bridge to span the tide.
"Old man," said a fellow pilgrim near,
"You are wasting your strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day,
Yon never again will pass this way;
You've crossed the chasm, deep and wide,
Why build this bridge at evening tide?"
The builder lifted his old gray head;
"Good friend, in the path I have come," he said,
"There followed after me to-day
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been as naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be;
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him!"
Anonymous.