Of all the men in our street
   I like the cobbler best,
Tapping, tapping at his last
   Without a minute’s rest;

Talking all the time he taps,
   Driving in the nails,
Smiling with his old grey eyes—­
   (Hush) . . . telling fairy tales.

THE LITTLE RED HOUSE

Very few grown-up people understand houses.  Only children understand them properly, and, if I understand them just a little, it is because I knew Sym.  Sym and his wife, Emily Ann, lived in the Little Red House.  It was built on a rather big mountain, and there were no other houses near it.  At one time, long ago, the mountain had been covered all over with a great forest; but men had cut the trees down, all but one big Blue-gum, which grew near the Little Red House.  The Blue-gum and the Little Red House were great friends, and often had long talks together.  The Blue-gum was a very old tree—­over a hundred years old—­and he was proud of it, and often used to tell of the time, long ago, when blackfellows hunted ’possums in his branches.  That was before the white men came to the mountain, and before there were any houses near it.

Once upon a time I put a verse about the mountain and the Little Red House into a book of rhymes which I wrote for grown ups.  I don’t think they thought much about it.  Very likely they said, “0h, it’s just a house on a hill,” and then forgot it, because they were too busy about other things.

This is the rhyme: 

A great mother mountain, and kindly is she,
Who nurses young rivers and sends them to sea. 
And, nestled high up on her sheltering lap,
Is a little red house, with a little straw cap
That bears a blue feather of smoke, curling high,
And a bunch of red roses cocked over one eye.

I have tried here to draw the Little Red House for you as well as I can; and it isn’t my fault if it happens to look just a little like somebody’s face.  I can’t help it, can I? if the stones of the door-step look something like teeth, or if the climbing roses make the windows look like a funny pair of spectacles.  And if Emily Ann will hang bib fluffy bobs on the window blinds for tassels, and if they swing about in the breeze like moving eyes, well, I am not to blame, am I?  It just happens.  The only thing I am sorry for is that I couldn’t get the big Blue-gum into the picture.  Of course, I could have drawn it quite easily, but it was too big.

Sym and Emily Ann were fond of the Little Red House, and you may be sure the Little Red House was fond of them—­he was their home.  The only thing that bothered him was that they were sometimes away from home, and then he was miserable, like all empty houses.

Now, Sym was a tinker—­a travelling tinker.  He would do a little gardening and farming at home for a while, and then go off about the country for a few days, mending people’s pots and pans and kettles.  Usually Sym left Emily Ann at home to keep the Little Red House company, but now and then Emily Ann went with Sym for a trip, and then the Little Red House was very sad indeed.