Journeys Through Bookland Volume X Part 33

"'O not in cruelty, not in wrath, The Reaper came that day;'

it was a young and beautiful Angel, not the hideous Death in black robes and hood scarce hiding his bony head, that

"'visited the green earth, And took the flowers away.'

"Does Death seem so terrible now? Although we must always see the vacant chair and know that a loved one has gone forever, can we not realize that it is we who suffer, and not the one who has been taken from among us? Is it not selfish to grieve?"

Shall we fear Death any more? When the parent has read the poem once more from beginning to end in silence, except as the soft words fall from his lips, will not the hearers feel inspired to be better and n.o.bler boys and girls, men and women? Will darkness have more fear for them? Will they not then go to their rooms and lie down peacefully to sleep?

There are other poems for other hours. Some day when you wish a bit of fun with your children you will find humorous poems in many of the books. One is in Volume IV, on page 57. Nearly every stanza contains a "joke": a pun, if you please, usually. Perhaps you and your children will find them all easily, and perhaps you will not. In the last stanza is the "joke" proper, the thing for which the rhymes were written. It is an old joke, surely enough, and you have seen others like it; but it is funny still and perhaps a little caustic. Not all men whom the world calls good are good beneath the surface. Perhaps you know of cases in which "the Dog it was that died."

Another humorous poem to use in this connection is _Echo_ (Volume III, page 286).

Between the two extremes mentioned above are selections for all moods and all kinds of people. The things to be remembered in reading with children are, that poetry must be understood to be appreciated; that it must be heard until the mind is trained to receive it through the eye instead of the ear; that it appeals to the feelings more than to the will; that it must be interpreted by the light of experience, and hence must be adapted to the age of the reader. A person would not read _The Reaper and the Flowers_ at a dancing party, nor _The Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog_ before a funeral.

Below are a few studies more complete and of different types.

_The Brown Thrush_

(Volume I, page 147)

We find great charm in this short lyric, for its form is unusual, its music joyous and its sentiment fine. Three lines of four feet each, a line of three feet, two lines of two feet each, and one line of three feet make up each stanza. The accent in each foot is on the last syllable, but some of the feet are only two syllables long. It's a merry meter. It scarcely can be read without stirring a rollicking melody in the ears of the listener. That's the art in the poem. The sentiment is as fine as the music. "The world's running over with joy! I'm as happy as happy can be." If the little brown thrush keeps singing that song the heart of everyone who hears it will overflow with joy. But it would be easy, very easy indeed, to stop the joyous song of the thrush by meddling with the five pretty eggs, and when the thrush changed his happy song to harsh notes of fear and reproach, the light of joy would fade from our day as quickly as from his.

_The Child's World_

(Volume II, page 66)

The unique measures of this brief poem make a melodious whole that every child will appreciate. Unless some care is taken in reading it aloud, however, much of its beauty will be lost. This is particularly true of the first stanza, from the first and last lines of which a syllable has been omitted. The absence of these syllables must be indicated by pauses or by giving more time to the word "great" in the first line, and to the word "world" in the last line. The idea may be indicated by supposing that the word "O" has been omitted from the beginning of the first and last line. The first line of the last couplet is peculiar in that every one of the four feet contains three syllables with the accent on the last. All the other lines consist each of four feet of either two or three syllables. Technically the poem is anapestic tetrameter much varied by the introduction of iambic feet. (See the studies in meter, Volume VII, pages 2 and 13.)

The rhymes are all in couplets and are perfect. The stanzas, like paragraphs, indicate changes in thought. Its pleasing unity rests in the fact that it is all a child's thoughts about the world. It is logical, a real leading up of thought to natural climax. The child begins with wonder and a sense of beauty around her. The world is great and wide and wonderful and beautiful. She thinks of the sea she has read about or seen and thinks of the wonderful water curling up in waves above the sh.o.r.e. To her the world is the land with the wonderful growing gra.s.s upon its broad breast, and this marks the end of her first thought--the great world is beautifully dressed.

Next as she sits on the brow of the hill and gazes over the lowland the breezes blow her hair about her face and her mind pa.s.ses to the wonderful air that as wind shakes the trees, ripples the water, whirls the mills and sings through the trees on the tops of the hills.

Thought wanders on to the nodding wheat, the rivers, cliffs, and islands, to the cities and the people everywhere for thousands of miles.

What is the effect of this vastness on the thought of a child? Can you not realize for yourself any clear night that you may gaze at the numberless stars in the arching skies? How small, how infinitely little are we in all the great universe! Have we the imagination to grasp the saving thought that comes so naturally into the clear mind of the child?

Though I am so small, so insignificant, I can think and love, but the wonderful earth can not. A philosophy well worth keeping, is it not?

_Seven Times One_

(Volume II, page 119)

Jean Ingelow's poem has in it many things to interest a child, but there may be some things that will be clearer for explanation.

Stanza 1. In England the daisy grows wild almost everywhere, a little, low plant which produces its heads of white, pink-tipped flowers from a rosette of leaves. In the United States we often see daisies in cultivation but they are nowhere native. The child is at her seventh birthday and has learned her multiplication table, the "sevens".

Nowadays in our schools the children do not have the drudgery of committing the long tables to memory as their grand-parents did. Our little friend thinks that as she has lived seven years that makes her "seven times one are seven."

Stanza 2. One is so old at seven, so very old--why one can even write a letter. But now with the birthday lessons learned she can think of other things; for instance there are the lambs who play always, for they have no lessons to learn. They are not old and they are "only one times one,"

not "seven times one," which are seven.

Stanza 3. She has seen the moon when it was full and bright and gave a wondrous light, but now it is only a pale crescent in the sky and its light is failing. Certainly the moon is failing and not like the child improving each day.

Stanza 4. Occasionally the child has done wrong and been punished, and perhaps the moon has done something wrong way up there in heaven so that G.o.d has hidden its face. If that is true she hopes soon G.o.d will forgive the poor moon and allow it to shine once more with its silver light.

Stanza 5. Isn't "velvet bee" a happy expression? Then the bee gathers the yellow pollen from the flowers, mixes and shapes it into little pellets and fastens them in golden b.a.l.l.s on its thighs to carry into the hive where it will serve as "bee bread" to feed the young bees. In the wet places grow the marsh marigolds, or cowslips as they are sometimes called, bright golden flowers like the b.u.t.tercups. To the bee and the cowslips the little child joyfully cries: "Give me your golden honey to hold, for I am seven years old and know what to do with it."

Stanza 6. The columbine is the graceful little flower we so often hear called honeysuckle. Five deep curved nectar-bearing tubes project backward from the flower itself. By opening the blossom in the right way the child of fanciful ideas may see shapes that remind her of turtle doves.

The cuckoo-pint (by the way, the _i_ is short as in _pit_) does not grow in the United States. It has spotted leaves, large and triangular, and the "bell" is an upright green cup in which stands a tall column, the "clapper." It is called cuckoo-pint because it blossoms about the time the cuckoo returns to England. Our nearest approach to the flower is the "Jack-in-the-Pulpit" or Indian Turnip.

It is perfectly safe for the columbine to unfold its wrapper and the cuckoo-pint to toll its bell in the presence of a maiden so old. She will not destroy them.

Stanza 7. In the United States we have no wild linnet, though we sometimes hear song-birds called by that name. The English linnet is a little sparrow with striped back and a purple crown and breast. He resembles our purple finch and our redpoll. He is one of the famous songsters of the English lanes and fields.

No young lady of seven would be so thoughtless as to steal away the young linnets, so the old bird may freely point out the nest.

At what time of the year does the little girl's birthday come?

_The First Snowfall_

(Volume II, page 403)

A. _The Author._ For a sketch of the life of James Russell Lowell, see Volume VII, page 411.

B. _The Meaning._ Words and Phrases:

"Gloaming"; early evening.

"Silence." The snow is called a silence, because it hushes noise, or prevents it.

"Pine and fir and hemlock"; three evergreen trees.

"Ermine"; the fur from a northern animal of the same name. It is very soft and white. Earls, n.o.bles of rank, wore ermine on their robes to show their high birth.

"Pearl"; a white, l.u.s.trous jewel, or the beautiful lining of some sea sh.e.l.ls.

"Carrara"; a town in Italy, whence comes the finest white marble. Here Carrara means _costly marble_.

"Swan's down." Swans have fine soft down between their feathers. It protects them from cold in winter, and in summer they line their nests with it.

"Noiseless work"; covering everything with snow.

"Mound"; grave.

"Auburn"; a beautiful cemetery near Boston.