is the Rhi-no-ce-ros!
I won-der why he looks so cross.
Per-haps he is an-noyed a bit
Be-cause his cloth-ing does not fit.
(They say he got it read-y made!)
It is not that, I am a-fraid.
He looks so cross be-cause I drew
Him with one horn in-stead of two.

Well, since he cares so much for style,
Let's give him two and see him smile.

A Penguin.

THE Pen-guin sits up-on the shore
And loves the lit-tle fish to bore;
He has one en-er-vat-ing joke
That would a very Saint pro-voke:
"The Pen-guin's might-i-er than the Sword-fish";
He tells this dai-ly to the bored fish,
Un-til they are so weak, they float
With-out re-sis-tance down his throat.

The Cat.

OB-SERVE the Cat up-on this page.
Phil-os-o-phers in ev-er-y age,
The ver-y _wis-est_ of the wise,
Have tried her mind to an-a-lyze
In vain, for noth-ing can they learn.
She baf-fles them at ev-er-y turn
Like Mis-ter Ham-let in the play.
She leads their rea-son-ing a-stray;
She feigns an in-ter-est in string
Or yarn or any roll-ing thing.
Un-like the Dog, she does not care
With com-mon Man her thoughts to share.
She teach-es us that in life's walk
'T is bet-ter to let oth-ers talk,
And lis-ten while _they_ say in-stead
The fool-ish things we might have said.

The Dog.

HERE is the Dog. Since time be-gan,
The Dog has been the friend of MAN,
The Dog loves MAN be-cause he shears
His coat and clips his tail and ears.
MAN loves the Dog be-cause he'll stay
And lis-ten to his talk all day,
And wag his tail and show de-light
At all his jokes, how-ev-er trite.
His bark is far worse than his bite,
So peo-ple say. They may be right;
Yet if to make a choice I had,
I'd choose his bark, how-ev-er bad.

A Chameleon.

A USE-FUL les-son you may con,
My Child, from the Cha-me-le-on:
He has the gift, ex-treme-ly rare
In an-i-mals, of sav-oir-faire.
And if the se-cret you would guess
Of the Cha-me-le-on's suc-cess,
A-dapt your-self with great-est care
To your sur-round-ings ev-er-y-where;
And then, un-less your sex pre-vent,
Some day you may be Pres-i-dent.

[Transcriber's Note: In this file, the ligatured oe character
is represented by "[oe]".]

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Child's Primer Of Natural History, by
Oliver Herford

*** END OF THIS PROJECT G