Child's Natural History

Geese Ev-er-y child who has the use Of his sen-ses knows a goose. Sees them un-der-neath the tree Gath-er round the goose-girl's knee, While she reads them by the hour From the works of Scho-pen-hau-er. How pa-tient-ly the geese at-tend! But do they re-al-ly com-pre-hend What Scho-pen-hau-er's driving at? Oh, not at all; but what of that? Nei-ther do I; nei-ther does she; And, for that matter, nor does he. A Seal See, children, the Furbearing Seal; Ob-serve his mis-di-rect-ed zeal; He dines with most ab-ste-mi-ous care On Fish, Ice Water and Fresh Air A-void-ing cond-i-ments or spice For fear his fur should not be nice And fine and soft and smooth and meet For Broad-way or for Re-gent Street, And yet some-how I often feel (Though for the kind Fur-bear-ing Seal I harbor a Re-spect Pro-found) He runs Fur-bear-ance in the ground. The Ant My child, ob-serve the use-ful Ant, How hard she works each day. She works as hard as ad-a-mant (That's very hard, they say). She has no time to gall-i-vant; She has no time to play. Let Fido chase his tail all day; Let Kitty play at tag; She has no time to throw away, She has no tail to wag; She scurries round from morn till night; She nev-er nev-er sleeps; She seiz-es ev-ery-thing in sight, She drags it home with all her might, And all she takes she keeps. The Yak This is the Yak, so negligee; His coif-fure's like a stack of hay; He lives so far from Any-where, I fear the Yak neglects his hair. And thinks, since there is none to see, What mat-ter how un-kempt he be: How would he feel if he but knew That in this Picture-book I drew His Phys-i-og-no-my un-shorn, For children to de-ride and scorn?