RD. The loss of your father.

MR. G. My father gone too?

STEWARD. Yes, poor gentleman, he took to his bed as soon as he heard of
it.

MR. G. Heard of what?

STEWARD. The bad news, an' it please your honour.

MR. G. What? more miseries, more bad news!

STEWARD. Yes, Sir, your bank has failed, your credit is lost and you're
not worth a shilling in the world. I make bold, Sir, to come and wait on
you about it; for I thought you would like to hear the news.

Puddock, Mousie, and Ratton

There lived a Puddock in a well,
And a merry Mousie in a mill.

Puddock he would a-wooing rid
Sword and pistol by his side.

Puddock came to the Mousie's inn,
"Mistress Mousie, are you within?"

MOUSIE.

"Yes, kind Sir, I am within,
Softly do I sit and spin."

PUDDOCK.

"Madam, I am come to woo,
Marriage I must have of you."

MOUSIE.

"Marriage I will grant you none
Till Uncle Ratton he comes home."

PUDDOCK.

"See, Uncle Ratton's now come in
Then go and bask the bride within."

Who is it that sits next the wall
But Lady Mousie both slim and small?

Who is it that sits next the bride
But Lord Puddock with yellow side?

But soon came Duckie and with her Sir Drake;
Duckie takes Puddock and makes him squeak.

Then came in the old carl cat
With a fiddle on his back:
"Do ye any music lack?"

Puddock he swam down the brook,
Sir Drake he catched him in his fluke.

The cat he pulled Lord Ratton down,
The kittens they did claw his crown.

But Lady Mousie, so slim and small,
Crept into a hole beneath the wall;
"Squeak," quoth she, "I'm out of it all."

The Little Bull-Calf

Centuries of years ago, when almost all this part of the country was
wilderness, there was a little boy, who lived in a poor bit of property
and his father gave him a little bull-calf, and with it he gave him
everything he wanted for it.

But soon after his father died, and his mother got married again to a
man that turned out to be a very vicious step-father, who couldn't abide
the little boy. So at last the step-father said: "If you bring that
bull-calf into this house, I'll kill it." What a villain he was, wasn't
he?

Now this little boy used to go out and feed his bull-calf every day with
barley bread, and when he did so this time, an old