carefully grilled,
And a savory stew, and a novel or two
She persuaded a neighbor to loan,
And a Japanese fan, and a hot water-can.
And a bottle of _eau de cologne_,
And the rest of the things that your family fill
Your room with whenever you chance to be ill.

She expected to find her decrepit but kind
Old grandmother waiting her call,
Exceedingly ill. Oh, that face on the pillow
Did not look familiar at all!
With a whitening cheek she started to speak,
But her peril she instantly saw:
Her grandma had fled and she'd tackled instead
Four merciless paws and a maw!
When the neighbors came running the wolf to subdue
He was licking his chops--and Red Riding Hood's, too!

At this horrible tale some readers will pale,
And others with horror grow dumb,
And yet it was better, I fear, he should get her:--
Just think what she might have become!
For an infant so keen might in future have been
A woman of awful renown,
Who carried on fights for her feminine rights,
As the Mare of an Arkansas town,
Or she might have continued the sin of her 'teens
And come to write verse for the Big Magazines!

_The Moral_

The Moral: There's nothing much glummer
Than children whose talents appal.
One much prefers those that are dumber,
And as for the paragons small--
If a swallow cannot make a summer.
It can bring on a summary fall!

[_Guy Wetmore Carryl_

A NAUTICAL BALLAD

A capital ship for an ocean trip,
Was the "Walloping Window-blind";
No gale that blew dismayed her crew
Or troubled the captain's mind.
The man at the wheel was taught to feel
Contempt for the wildest blow,
And it often appeared, when the weather had cleared,
That he'd been in his bunk below.

"The boatswain's mate was very sedate,
Yet fond of amusement, too;
And he played hop-scotch with the starboard watch,
While the captain tickled the crew.
And the gunner we had was apparently mad,
For he sat on the after rail,
And fired salutes with the captain's boots,
In the teeth of the booming gale.

"The captain sat in a commodore's hat
And dined in a royal way
On toasted pigs and pickles and figs
And gummery bread each day.
But the cook was Dutch and behaved as such;
For the diet he gave the crew
Was a number of tons of hot-cross buns
Prepared with sugar and glue.

"All nautical pride we laid aside,
And we cast the vessel ashore
On t