Listen well unto the story which the Laureate

shall sing,

Full of love as is the trysting of two bluebirds in the Spring.

In the Spring a little madder tints the temper of the rose;

In the Spring a young man's fondness is for anything but prose;

In the Spring a maiden's bonnet shows the iris of the wren;

In the Spring the budding poet is addicted to

the pen.

So I, too, in life's sweet springtime, when the Idyls all were done,

Wrote this fairy-tale so famous, just for exercise and fun.

Then her cheek was round and rosy as should

be in any case,

And her conversation seemed to me the height

of verbal grace.

And I said, "My Cin

derella, on the rosary

of truth,

Backward tell the beads,

that I may learn the

story of your youth."

On her cheek the blushes

hinted of the rose's

pinky leaf,

In her eye the moisture gathered in the stormcloud of her grief;

And she turned northeast

by north, and in a most dramatic style

Struck the keynote of her sorrow and the sun

shine of her smile,

Saying, "I have laved the linen for a family of

three;"

Saying, "That was long ago, but now they get

no more of me."

Here she took a glass of water in her jewel

fingered fist;

Every second as she swallowed irrevocably was missed.

Then, refreshed, proceeded slowly, and with very great detail,

To repeat the little story of the slipper small and frail.

You'll excuse me if I tell it in my own peculiar

way,

For her grammar had the errors of the grammars of her day.

Now I think as all the points of the defence are handed in,

It is time that I the counsel for the plaintiff should begin.

Cinderella had two sisters, the relationship

was such

That they weren't disposed to congregate together very much.

History records precisely, and

the little lass avers,

That her father was their

father, but their mother

was n't hers.

Jealousy the seeds of
Hatred sowed

in Cinder

ella's home;

When her sisters brushed her hair they never

failed to yank the comb.

Cinderella's beauty brought her bitter blossom

ings of Hate,

And her goings were restricted by the kitchen and the gate.

She was slave to their siestas when the dinner hour was o'er;

She must wash the china dishes, she must scrub the kitchen floor;

She must shovel coal, and Monday do the washing in the morn;

She must wear a constant smile that shall but sharpen up their scorn;

She must sleep up in the garret, say her prayers

a prey to rats,

And avoid a chance of comfort on a bedstead

minus slats.

They would call her naughty names and do their best to make her say

Something wrong to give their mother's muscle exercise that day.