Hush-a-by baby: as the birds fly,
We are off to the island of Lullaby:
I am the captain, and you are the crew,
And the cradle, I guess, is our birch-bark canoe;
We'll drift away from this work-day shore,
Forty thousand long leagues or more,
Till we reach the strand where happy dreams wait,
Whether we're early, or whether we're late.
Hush-a-by baby: as the birds fly,
Let us make the snug harbor of Lullaby:
Some little folks are far on the way;
Some have put in at Wide-awake Bay;
Others, I fear, are long overdue;
Don't let this happen, my darling, to you:
Let us steer for the coast where happy dreams wait,
Whether we're early, or whether we're late.
MARY N. PRESCOTT.
WHERE JIMMY LIVES.
IMMY MASON lives on a ranche in Colorado. Do you know what a ranche is? It is a kind of farm,—not a farm for raising wheat and potatoes and oats and corn, but for rearing horses and cattle and sheep.
Jimmy's papa has about a hundred horses, as many cows, and a great many hundred sheep. He does not keep them in barns, or feed them with hay, but they roam over the hills, and feed on grass both in winter and summer.
Mr. Mason's house is five miles from any neighbor, and fifteen miles from town. There is no garden or fence round it, and there are no trees to be seen anywhere near. But there are wild flowers in abundance. One of them is a species of cactus. It bears beautiful yellow blossoms in summer, after which comes the fruit, a prickly pear, not good to eat. Another kind of cactus has crimson and scarlet blossoms, but no prickly pears.