I.

INTO this world we come like ships,
Launch'd from the docks, and stocks, and slips,
For fortune fair or fatal ;

And one little craft is cast away

In its very first trip in Babbicombe Bay,
While another rides safe at Port Natal.

What different lots our stars accord!

This babe to be hail'd and woo'd as a Lord!
And that to be shunn'd like a leper!
One, to the world's wine, honey, and corn,
Another, like Colchester native, born

To its vinegar, only, and pepper.

One is litter'd under a roof

Neither wind nor water proof

That's the prose of Love in a Cottage

A puny, naked, shivering wretch,

The whole of whose birthright would not fetch, Though Robins himself drew up the sketch, The bid of "a mess of pottage."

Born of Fortunatus's kin,

Another comes tenderly usher'd in

To a prospect all bright and burnish'd;

No tenant he for life's back slums

He comes to the world, as a gentleman comes To a lodging ready furnish'd.

THOMAS HOOD. Poetical Works. (Ward, Lock, and Co.) [By kind permission of the Publishers.]

A BABE in a house is a well-spring of pleasure, a messenger of peace and love :

A resting-place for innocence on earth; a link between angels and men:

Yet is it a talent of trust, a loan to be rendered back with interest;

A delight, but redolent of care; honey-sweet, but lacking not the bitter.

For character groweth day by day, and all things aid it in unfolding,

And the bent unto good or evil may be given in the hours of infancy :

Scratch the green rind of a sapling, or wantonly twist it in the soil,

The scarred and crooked oak will tell of thee for centuries to come;

Even so mayst thou guide the mind to good, or lead it to the marrings of evil,

For disposition is builded up by the fashioning of first impressions:

Wherefore, though the voice of Instruction waiteth for the ear of reason,

Yet with his mother's milk the young child drinketh Education.

Patience is the first great lesson; he may learn it at the breast:

And the habit of obedience and trust may be grafted on his mind in the cradle;

Hold the little hands in prayer, teach the weak knees their kneeling ;

Let him see thee speaking to thy God; he will not forget it afterward;

When old and grey will he feelingly remember a mother's tender piety,

And the touching recollection of her prayers shall arrest the strong man in his sin.

MARTIN F. TUPPER. Proverbial Philosophy. (Ward, Lock, and Co.)

FOUR years I've wed; not one has passed in vain ;
Behold the fifth! behold a babe again!
My wife's gay friends th' unwelcome imp admire,
And fill the room with gratulation dire.

GEORGE CRABBE.
The Parish Register: Baptisms.

MY FIRST-BORN.

"HE shan't be their namesake, the rather
That both are such opulent men ;
His name shall be that of his father,
My Benjamin, shorten'd to Ben.

"Yes, Ben, though it cost him a portion
In each of my relatives' wills:

I scorn such baptismal extortion

(That creaking of boots must be Squills). "It is clear, though his means may be narrow, This infant his Age will adorn;

I shall send him to Oxford from Harrow,-
I wonder how soon he'll be born!"
A spouse thus was airing his fancies

Below, 'twas a labour of love,
And was calmly reflecting on Nancy's

More practical labour above;
Yet, while it so pleased him to ponder,
Elated, at ease, and alone;
That pale, patient victim up yonder
Had budding delights of her own :
Sweet thoughts, in their essence diviner
Than paltry ambition and pelf;
A cherub, no babe will be finer !

Invented and nursed by herself;
At breakfast, and dining, and teaing,
An appetite nought can appease,
And quite a Young-Reasoning-Being
When call'd on to yawn and to sneeze.
What cares that heart, trusting and tender,
For fame or avuncular wills?

Except for the name and the gender,

She's almost as tranquil as Squills.

That father, in reverie centred,

Dumfounder'd, his thoughts in a whirl, Heard Squills, as the creaking boots enter'd, Announce that his Boy was-a Girl.

FREDERICK LOCKER. London Lyrics. (K. Paul.)

MOTHER, on my returning home
Last night, I went to my wife's room,
Who, whispering me that our alarms
Were over, put into my arms
Your Grandson. And I give you joy
Of what, I'm told, is a fine boy.
Their notion that he's just like me
Is neither fact nor flattery!
To you I'll own the little wight
Fill'd me, unfatherly, with fright,
So grim it gazed, and, out of the sky,
There came, minute, remote, the cry,
Piercing, of original pain.

I put the wonder back to Jane,
Who proffer'd, as in kindly course,
Untried amends for strange divorce.
It guess'd at once, by great good luck,
The clever baby, how to suck!
Yet Jane's delight seem'd dash'd, that I,
Of strangers still by nature shy,
Was not familiar quite so soon

With her small friend of many a moɔn.

But when the new-made Mother smiled, She seem'd herself a little child, Dwelling at large beyond the law By which, till then, I judged and saw, And that fond glow which she felt stir

For it, suffused my heart for her;

To whom, from the weak babe, and thence
To me, an influent innocence,
Happy, reparative of life,

Came, and she was indeed my wife,
As there, lovely with love she lay,
Brightly contented all the day
To hug her sleepy little boy
In the reciprocated joy

Of touch, the childish sense of love,
Ever inquisitive to prove

Its strange possession, and to know
If the eyes' report be really so.

COVENTRY PATMORE.
The Angel in the House. (G. Bell.)

BABY BELL. [EXTRACT.]

SHE came and brought delicious May,
The swallows built beneath the eaves;
Like sunlight, in and out the leaves