ongin eyes on his face,
For he's my darlin of darlins, and if he don't soon
come back, you'll see me drop stone dead on the place.
I only wish I'd got him safe in these two Motherly
arms, and wouldn't I hug him and kiss him!
Lauk! I never knew what a precious he was--
but a child don't not feel like a child till you miss him.
Why, there he is! Punch and Judy hunting, the
young wretch, it's that Billy as sartin as sin!
But let me get him home, with a good grip of his hair,
and I'm blest if he shall have a whole bone in his skin!

THE FOX AND THE HEN.

A FABLE.

Speaking within _compass_, as to fabulousness I prefer
_Southcote_ to _Northcote_.
PIGROGROMITUS.

One day, or night, no matter where or when,
Sly Reynard, like a foot-pad, laid his pad
Right on the body of a speckled Hen,
Determined upon taking all she had;
And like a very bibber at his bottle,
Began to draw the claret from her throttle;
Of course it put her in a pretty pucker,
And with a scream as high
As she could cry,
She call'd for help--she had enough of sucker.

Dame Partlet's scream
Waked, luckily, the house-dog from his dream,
And, with a savage growl
In answer to the fowl,
He bounded forth against the prowling sinner,
And, uninvited, came to the Fox Dinner.

Sly Reynard, heedful of the coming doom,
Thought, self-deceived,
He should not be perceived,
Hiding his _brush_ within a neighboring _broom_!
But quite unconscious of a Poacher's snare,
And caught in copper noose,
And looking like a goose,
Found that his fate had "hung upon a _hare_";
His tricks and turns were rendered of no use to him,
And worst of all he saw old surly Tray
Coming to play
Tray-Deuce with him.

Tray, an old Mastiff bred at Dunstable,
Under his Master, a most special constable,
Instead of killing Reynard in a fury,
Seized him for legal trial by a Jury;
But Juries--AEsop was a sheriff then--
Consisted of twelve Brutes and not of Men.

But first the Elephant sat on the body--
I mean the Hen--and proved that she was dead,
To the veriest fool's head
Of the Booby and the Noddy.

Accordingly, the Stork brought in a bill
Quite true enough to kill,
And then the Owl was call'd,--for, mark,
The Owl can witness in the dark.
To make the evidence more plain,
The Lynx connected all the chain.