me and clothe me in a human form."

They swept up much, they shovelled up more,
There never was such a snow-man before!
They built him bravely with might and main,
There never will be such a snow-man again!
His legs were big, his body was bigger,
They made him a most imposing figure;
His eyes were large and as black as coal,
For a cinder was placed in each round hole.
And the sight of his teeth would have made yours ache,
Being simply the teeth of an ancient rake.
They smoothed his forehead, they patted his back,
There wasn't a single unsightly crack;
And when they had given the final pat,
They crowned his head with the scare-crow's hat.

And so
The Brook--the Cloud--the Snow,
Got its own way after so many days,
And did put on a human form and face.
But whether
The situation pleased it altogether;
If it is nice
To be a man of snow and ice;
Whether it feels
Painful, when one congeals;
How this man felt
When he began to melt;
Whether he wore his human form and face
With any extraordinary grace;
If many mortals fell
As victims to the spell;
Or if,
As he stood, stark and stiff,
With a bare broomstick in his arms,
And not a trace of transcendental charms,
That man of snow
Grew wise enough to know
That the Brook's hopes were but a Poet's dream,
And well content to be again a stream,
On the first sunny day,
Flowed quietly away;
Or what the end was--You must ask the Poet,
I don't know it.

[Illustration]

A SOLDIER'S CHILDREN.

Our home used to be in a hut in the dear old Camp, with lots of bands
and trumpets and bugles and Dead Marches, and three times
a day there was a gun,
But now we live in View Villa at the top of the village, and it isn't
nearly such fun.
We never see any soldiers, except one day we saw a Volunteer, and we
ran after him as hard as ever we could go, for we thought he
looked rather brave;
But there's only been one funeral since we came, an ugly black thing
with no Dead March or Union Jack, and not even a firing party
at the grave.
There is a man