And over the top of the hill
The good little sheep run quick and soft,
And the house upstairs is still.

And one slips over and one comes next,
The good little, gray little sheep!
I watch how the fire burns red and low,
And she says that I fall asleep.

Josephine Daskam Bacon.

[Footnote 10: From "Poems," copyright, 1903, by Chas. Scribner's
Sons.]

_Minnie and Winnie_

Minnie and Winnie
Slept in a shell.
Sleep, little ladies!
And they slept well.

Pink was the shell within,
Silver without;
Sounds of the great sea
Wandered about.

Sleep, little ladies!
Wake not soon!
Echo on echo
Dies to the moon.

Two bright stars
Peeped into the shell.
"What are they dreaming of?
Who can tell?"

Started a green linnet
Out of the croft;
Wake, little ladies!
The sun is aloft.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

_Queen Mab_

A little fairy comes at night;
Her eyes are blue, her hair is brown,
With silver spots upon her wings,
And from the moon she flutters down.

She has a little silver wand,
And when a good child goes to bed,
She weaves her wand from right to left,
And makes a circle round its head.

And then it dreams of pleasant things--
Of fountains filled with fairy fish,
And trees that bear delicious fruit,
And bow their branches at a wish;

Of arbors filled with dainty scents
From lovely flowers that never fade,
Bright flies that glitter in the sun,
And glow-worms shining in the shade;

And talking birds with gifted tongues
For singing songs and telling tales,
And pretty dwarfs to show the way
Through fairy hills and fairy dales.

Thomas Hood.

_A Boy's Mother_[11]

My mother she's so good to me,
Ef I was good as I could be,
I couldn't be as good--no, sir!--
Can't any boy be good as her.

She loves me when I'm glad er sad;
She loves me when I'm good er bad;
An', what's a funniest thing, she says
She loves me when she punishes.

I don't like her to punish me,--
That don't hurt,--but it hurts to see
Her cryin'.--Nen _I_ cry; an' nen
We both cry an' be good again.

She loves me when she cuts an' sews
My little cloak an' Sund'y