WEBSTER'S LITTLE FOLKS' SPEAKER.

GOOD FOR SOMETHING.

ANON.

[Speak in as natural a way as you can.]

"Good for nothing little son,"

Papa calls me, just for fun;
But I've heard my mother say

I'm good for something all the day.

Good to clatter up the room;

Good to ride outside the broom;

Good to tip the basket o'er

And roll the spools about the floor.

Good to pull the baby's hair

And make a horse of every chair;

Good to tumble on the floor

And shut poor fingers in the door.

Good to wear out little shoes
And mamma's pretty thimble lose;
Good dear grandpa's specs to hide
And on his foot to take a ride.

Good, before I go to sleep,

To pray the Lord my soul to keep,
And ask him if he'll bless mamma
And baby sister, and papa.

Good to wake up with the day,
And good to study, good to play.
Tell me, ere I make my bow,
Ain't I good for something, now?

DAME DUCK'S FIRST LECTURE ON MANNERS.

ANON.

[To be given in a simple, direct way, imitating the quacking of a duck in the last stanza.]

Old Mother Duck has hatched a brood

Of ducklings small and callow;
Their little wings are short; their down
Is mottled gray and yellow.

Close by the margin of the brook
The old duck made her nest

Of straw, and leaves, and withered grass,
And down from her own breast.

And there she sat for four long weeks,
In rainy days and fine,

Until the ducklings all came out—
Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.

One peeped out from beneath her wing,
One scrambled on her back,

"That's very rude," said old Dame Duck;
"Behave yourselves! Quack, quack!"

AN OLD HEN.

M. M. D.

[Speak as if you were telling a great secret.]

An old hen sat on turtles' eggs

And she hatched out goslings three;

Two were turkeys with slender legs,

THE OWL AND THE PUSSY CAT.

EDWARD LEAR.

[Give in a comical, descriptive manner.]

The owl and the pussy cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat;

They took some honey, and plenty of money
Wrapped up in a five pound note.

The owl looked up to the moon above,
And sang to a small guitar-

"Oh, lovely pussy! Oh, pussy, my love!
What a beautiful pussy you are!
You are-

What a beautiful pussy you are!"

Pussy said to the owl: "You elegant fowl,
How wonderful sweet you sing!

Oh, let us be married, too long we have tarried,
But what shall we do for a ring?"

They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To land where the Bong tree grows,
And there in a wood a piggy-wig stood
With a ring in the end of his nose!
His nose-

With a ring in the end of his nose!

"Dear pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
Your ring?" Said the piggy, "I will!"
So they took it away, and were married that day
By the turkey who lives on the hill.

They dined on mince and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon,
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
They danced by the light of the moon-
The moon-

They danced by the light of the moon!

[Speak as if you were telling a great secret.]

I never spoke before to-day.
The smallest boy am I;

And, as I've nothing much to say,

[Give this in a mock pedantic sort of style.]

"Todes is like frogs, but more dignity, and wen you come to think of it frogs is wetter. The warts which todes is noted for can't be cured, for they is cronick; but if I couldn't git well I'd stay in the house. My grandfather knew a tode which somebody had tamed till it new folks. When its master wissled it would come for flies. They ketches 'em with their tung, wich is some like a long red worm, but more like litenin', only litenin ain't got any gum onto it. The fly will be a standin' a rubbin' its hine legs together, and a thinkin' what a fine fly it is, and a tode a settin some distance away like it was asleep. While you are seein' the fly as plain as you ever see anything, all to once it ain't there. Then the tode he looks up at you sollem, out of his eyes, like he said, 'what's become of that fly?' But you know he et it."

COUNTING BABY'S TOES.

MRS. MILLER.

[Speak this simply, counting the fingers of one hand, one after another, in giving the 2d stanza.]