'
It was her thought really running on; she never could have found the
words like that. She thought in French, too, for one thing. And, in
any case, Rogers could not have heard her, for he was listening now to
the uproar of the children as they criticised Daddy's ridiculous
effusion. A haystack, courted in vain by zephyrs, but finally taken
captive by an equinoctial gale, strained nonsense too finely for their
sense of what was right and funny. It was the pictures he now drew in
the book that woke their laughter. He gave the stack a physiognomy
that they recognised.
'But, Mother, he's making it look like you!' cried Monkey--only Mother
was too far away in her magnificent reverie to reply intelligently.
I know her; she's my friend,' she answered vaguely. 'So it's all
right.'
'Majestic Haystack'--it was the voice of the wind addressing her:--
'Majestic Haystack, Empress of my life,
Your ample waist
Just fits the gown I fancy for my wife,
And suits my taste;
Yet there you stand, flat-footed, square and deep,
An unresponsive, elephantine heap,
Coquetting with the stars while I'm asleep,
O cruel Stack!
Coy, silent Monster, Matron of the fields,
I sing to you;
And all the fondest love that summer yields
I bring to you;
Yet there you squat, immense in your disdain,
Heedless of all the tears of streaming rain
My eyes drip over you--your breathless swain;
O stony Stack!
Stupendous Maiden, sweetest when oblong,
Does inner flame
Now smoulder in thy soul to hear my song
Repeat thy name?
Or does thy huge and ponderous heart object
The advances of my passion, and reject
My love because it's airy and elect?
O wily Stack!
O crested goddess, thatched and top-knotted,
O reckless Stack!
Of wives that to the Wind have been allotted
There is no lack;
You've spurned my love as though I were a worm;
But next September when I see thy form,
I'll woo thee with an equinoctial storm!
I have that knack!'
'Far less wumbled than usual,' thought Rogers, as the children danced
about the room, making up new ridiculous rhymes, of which 'I'll give
you a whack' seemed the most popular.
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