Ladybird, ladybird! fly away home! 
  The glow-worm is lighting her lamp,
The dew’s falling fast, and your fine speckled wings
  Will flag with the close-clinging damp.

Ladybird, ladybird! fly away home! 
  Good luck if you reach it at last! 
The owl’s come abroad, and the bat’s on the roam,
  Sharp set from their Ramazan fast.

Ladybird, ladybird! fly away home! 
  The fairy bells tinkle afar! 
Make haste or they’ll catch you, and harness you fast
  With a cobweb to Oberon’s car.

Ladybird, ladybird! fly away home! 
  To your house in the old willow-tree,
Where your children so dear have invited the ant
  And a few cozy neighbors to tea.

Ladybird, ladybird! fly away home! 
  And if not gobbled up by the way,
Nor yoked by the fairies to Oberon’s car,
  You’re in luck! and that’s all I’ve to say!
                       Caroline B. Southey.

THE BLUEBIRD

I know the song that the bluebird is singing,
Out in the apple-tree where he is swinging;
Brave little fellow, the skies may look dreary;
Nothing cares he while his heart is so cheery.

Hark! how the music leaps out from his throat,
Hark! was there ever so merry a note? 
Listen awhile and you’ll hear what he’s saying,
Up in the apple-tree swinging and swaying.

“Dear little blossoms down under the snow,
You must be weary of winter, I know;
Hark, while I sing you a message of cheer;
Summer is coming and spring-time is here!

“Little white snowdrop!  I pray you arise;
Bright yellow crocus! come, open your eyes;
Sweet little violets, hid from the cold,
Put on your mantles of purple and gold;
Daffodils! daffodils! say, do you hear?—­
Summer is coming and spring-time is here!”
                      Emily Huntington Miller.

THE BLUE JAY

O Blue Jay up in the maple tree,
Shaking your throat with such bursts of glee,
How did you happen to be so blue? 
Did you steal a bit of the lake for your crest,
And fasten blue violets into your vest? 
Tell me, I pray you,—­tell me true!

Did you dip your wings in azure dye,
When April began to paint the sky,
That was pale with the winter’s stay? 
Or were you hatched from a blue-bell bright,
’Neath the warm, gold breast of a sunbeam light,
By the river one blue spring day?

O Blue Jay up in the maple tree,
A-tossing your saucy head at me,
With ne’er a word for my questioning,
Pray, cease for a moment your “ting-a-link,”
And hear when I tell you what I think,—­
You bonniest bit of spring.

I think when the fairies made the flowers,
To grow in these mossy fields of ours,
Periwinkles and violets rare,
There was left of the spring’s own color, blue,
Plenty to fashion a flower whose hue
Would be richer than all and as fair.