ute to watch every trick,
And keep me in line all the time with her kick.

Leader of the Gang

Seems only just a year ago that he was toddling round the place
In pretty little colored suits and with a pink and shining face.
I used to hold him in my arms to watch when our canary sang,
And now tonight he tells me that he's leader of his gang.

It seems but yesterday, I vow, that I with fear was almost dumb,
Living those dreadful hours of care waiting the time for him to come;
And I can still recall the thrill of that first cry of his which rang
Within our walls. And now that babe tells me he's leader of his gang.

Gone from our lives are all the joys which yesterday we used to own;
The baby that we thought we had, out of the little home has flown,
And in his place another stands, whose garments in disorder hang,
A lad who now with pride proclaims that he's the leader of his gang.

And yet somehow I do not grieve for what it seems we may have lost;
To have so strong a boy as this, most cheerfully I pay the cost.
I find myself a sense of joy to comfort every little pang,
And pray that they shall find in him a worthy leader of the gang.

Ma and the Ouija Board

I don't know what it's all about, but Ma says that she wants to know
If spirits in the other world can really talk to us below.
An' Pa says, "Gosh! there's folks enough on earth to talk to, I should
think,
Without you pesterin' the folks whose souls have gone across the brink."
But Ma, she wants to find out things an' study on her own accord,
An' so a month or two ago she went an' bought a ouija board.

It's just a shiny piece of wood, with letters printed here an' there,
An' has a little table which you put your fingers on with care,
An' then you sit an' whisper low some question that you want to know.
Then by an' by the spirit comes an' makes the little table go,
An' Ma, she starts to giggle then an' Pa just grumbles out, "Oh, Lord!
I wish you hadn't bought this thing. We didn't need a ouija board."

"You're movin' it!" says Ma to Pa. "I'm not!" says Pa, "I know it's you;
You're makin' it spell things to us that you know very well aren't true."
"That isn't so," says Ma to him, "but I am certain from the way
The ouija moves that you're the one who's tellin' it just what to say."
"It's just 'lectricity," says Pa; "like batteries all men are stored,
But anyhow I don't believe we ought to have a ouija board."

One night Ma got it out, an'