land. But one
ought never to allow such a habit as swearing,--or shooting,' added the
Owl gravely, 'to become automatic. Let me see, where did I begin? I was
telling you about the female dragon-worshippers, who dress in symbolical
costumes, like the old priestesses or the Salvation Army captains.
Lately, though, a good many of the women who were brought up to it have
taken "a new departure," and gone off after the wholesale education
establishments at Camford, where they are fed on biscuits and marmalade,
and illuminate the fragments of Sappho on vellum. This may not be very
good: still I think it is better than the Dragon; the worst of it is
that it forces up the educational prices.'

With which remark the Owl began a long series of observations, a mixture
of political economy and his views on popular education, which Queen Mab
found rather tedious. But they inspired her with a few verses, which
she resolved, being the most philanthropic of fairies, and full of
compassion for the dreary state of Great Britain in general, and of
the rising generation in particular, to circulate among the Polynesian
children as soon as she returned home. In this determination,
unfortunately, she either forgot or ignored the fact that she had
left her happy island a prey to the combined effects of annexation,
civilisation, and evangelisation. But the verses ran thus:

'Upon my childhood's pallid morn
No tropic summer smiled,
In foreign lands I was not born,
A happy, heathen child.

Alas! but in a colder clime,
A cultured clime, I dwell
All in the foremost ranks of time,
They say: I know it well.

_You_ never learn geography,
No grammar makes you wild,
A book, a slate you never see,
You happy, heathen child.

I know in forest and in glade
Your games are odd but gay,
Think of the little British maid,
Who has no place for play.

When ended is the day's long joy,
And you to rest have gone,
Think of the little British boy,
Who still is toiling on.

The many things we learn about,
We cannot understand.
Ah, send your missionaries out
To this benighted land!

You blessed little foreigner,
In weather fair and mild,
Think of the tiny Britisher,
Oh, happy heathen child.

Ah! highly favoured Pagan, born
In some far hemisphere,
Pity the British child forlorn,
And drop o