Читать книгу Mother Goose for Grown Folks - Whitney Adeline Dutton Train - Страница 15

"Sing a song o' sixpence, a pocket full of rye;

Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie:

When the pie was opened, they all began to sing,

And was n't this a dainty dish to set before the king?

The king was in his counting-house, counting out his money;

The queen was in the parlor, eating bread and honey;

The maid was in the garden, hanging out the clothes,

And along came a blackbird, and nipt off her nose!"

It doesn't take a conjurer to see

The sort of curious pasty this might be;

A flock of flying rumors, caught alive,

And housed, like swarming bees within a

hive,—

Instead of what were far more wisely

done,

Having their worthless necks wrung, every

one;—

And so a dish of dainty gossip making,

Smooth covered with a show of secrecy,

That one but takes the pleasant pains of

breaking,

And out the wide-mouthed knaves pop,

eagerly.

Blackbirds, indeed! Each chattering on-

dit

Comes forth, full feathered, black as black

can be;

With quivering throats, all tremulous to

sing,

And please, forsooth, some little social

king;

Whose reign may last as long as he is able

To call his court around a dinner-table.