THE PRINCESS MING

They were led by Tsing,

And they called for Ming,

Which all will allow was a terrible thing!

Miss Ming's papa girt on his sword-
"For this," quoth he, "I'll have his gore!"
In vain the Princess Ming implored-
In vain she swooned on the palace floor-
The Princess Ming

Who was wooed of Tsing

Could not prevail with the gruff old King!

The old King opened the palace gate

And in marched Tsing with his soldiers grim, And the King smote Tsing on his princely pateStating this stern rebuke to him:

"It's a fatal thing

For you, Mr. Tsing,

To come a-courting the Princess Ming!"

The prince most keenly felt this slight,

But still more keenly the cut on his head;

So, suddenly turning cold and white,

He fell to the earth and lay there dead.
Which act of the King

To the handsome Tsing
Was a brutal shock to the Princess Ming.

No sooner did the young prince die

Than Princess Ming from the palace flew,
And jumped straight into the River Ji,
With the dreadful purpose of dying, too!
"Twas a natural thing

For the Princess Ming

To do for love of the handsome Tsing!

And when she leaped in the River Ji,

And gasped and choked til! her face was blue,

A crocodile fish came paddling by

And greedily bit Miss Ming in two

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The horrid old thing

Devoured Miss Ming,

Who had hoped to die for the love of Tsing.

When the King observed her life adjourned,
By the crocodile's biting the girl in twain,
Up to the ether his toes he turned,

With a ghastly rent in his jugular vein;
So the poor old King,

And Tsing, and Ming

Were dead and gone-what a terrible thing!

And as for the crocodile fish that had Devoured Miss Ming in this off-hand way, He caught the dyspepsy so dreadful bad That he, too, died that very day!

So, now, with the King,

And Tsing, and Ming,

And the crocodile dead, what more can I sing?

AN ELFIN SUMMONS

FROM the flow'rs and from the trees
Come, O tiny midnight elves,
And, to music of the breeze,

Merrily disport yourselves.
Harnessing the glow-worm's wing,
Drive the glow-worm for your steed,
Or with crickets dance and sing
On the velvet, perfumed mead.
Forth from pretty blue-bells creep

To coquette with starlight gleam-
See, the lambkins are asleep

And the daisies sleeping dream.
Hasten to engage yourselves
In your frolics, midnight elves!

A BROOK SONG

See, a toad with jewelled eyes

Comes and croaks his homely song
To the spider as she plies

Her deft spinning all night long;
See the bat with rustling wings
Darting nervously above-
Hear the cricket as she sings
To her little violet love.
All the goblins are asleep

And no flimflam hovers near,
So from out the posies creep
With your Elfin ladies dear;
Merrily disport yourselves,
Frisky little midnight elvesi

A BROOK SONG

I'm hastening from the distant hills.
With swift and noisy flowing,
Nursed by a thousand tiny rills,
I'm ever onward going.

The willows cannot stay my course,
With all their pliant wooing.

I sing and sing till I am hoarse,
My prattling way pursuing.

I kiss the pebbles as I pass,

And hear them say they love me;
I make obeisance to the grass
That kindly bends above me.

So onward through the meads and dells
I hasten, never knowing

The secret motive that impels,
Or whither I am going.

A little child comes often here
To watch my quaint commotion,
As I go tumbling, swift and clear,
Down to the distant ocean;

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And as he plays upon my brink,
So thoughtless like and merry,
And full of noisy song, I think
The child is like me, very.
Through all the years of youthful play,
With ne'er a thought of sorrow,
We, prattling, speed upon our way,
Unmindful of the morrow;

Aye, through these sunny meads and dells
We gambol, never trowing
The solemn motive that impels,

Or whither we are going.

And men come here to say to me:
"Like you, with weird commotion,

O little singing brooklet, we

Are hastening to an ocean;
Down to a vast and misty deep,

With fleeting tears and laughter,

We go, nor rest until we sleep

In that profound Hereafter.

What tides may bear our souls along-
What monsters rise appalling-
What distant shores may hear our song
And answer to our calling?

Ah, who can say! through meads and dells
We wander, never knowing

The awful motive that impels,
Or whither we are going!"

THE DISMAL DOLE OF THE DOODLEDOO

A BINGO bird once nestled her nest
On the lissom bough of an I O yew,
Hard by a burrow that was possess'd
Of a drear and dismal doodledoo.

THE DISMAL DOLE OF THE DOODLEDOO

Eftsoons this doodledoo descried

The blithe and beautiful bingo bird,
He vowed he'd woo her to be his bride
With many a sleek and winsome word.
"Oh, doo! oh, doo!" sang the doodledoo
To the bingo bird in the yarrish yew.

Now a churlish chit was the bingo bird,

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Though her plumes were plumes of cardinal hue, And she smithered a smirk whenever she heard The tedious yawp of the doodledoo; For she loved, alas! a subtile snaix,

Which had a sting at the end of his tail And lived in a tarn of sedge and brakes

On the murky brink of a gruesome swail. "Oh, doo! oh, doo!" moaned the doodledoo, As dimmer and danker each day he grew.

Now, when this doodledoo beheld

The snaix go wooing the bingo bird,
With envious rancor his bosom swelled-
His soul with bitter remorse was stirred.
And a flubdub said to the doodledoo,
"The subtile snaix isn't toting square-
I tell no tales-but if I were you,

I'd stop his courting the bingo fair!
Aye, marry, come up, I'd fain imbrue,
If I were only a doodledoo!"

These burning words which the flubdub said
Inflamed the reptile's tortured soul

Till the bristles rose on his livid head,

And his slimy tongue began for to roll;
His skin turned red and his fangs turned black
And his eyes exuded a pool of tears,

And the scales stood up on his bony back,

And fire oozed out of his nose and ears!

Oh, he was a terrible sight to view—
This fierce and vengeful doodledoo!