32 
NATURE NOTES. 
Occasionally we think Lady Lindsay is less happy. Her verses to the daisy 
do not please us, perhaps because so many poets have already sung so well about 
it ; and we must demur to the depicting of “ lords and ladies ” and water-lilies 
on the same canvas. But the following is a good children’s rhyme : — 
“ Cluck, cluck,” said the old brown hen, 
' “ Cock-a-roo-croo,” said the cock ; 
“ Surely at dawn, every now and then. 
There’s something amiss with the clock ; 
For we teach the time to the tiniest chick 
A vast deal better than he can tick ! ” 
Here are two beautiful verses : — 
Said Day to Night : 
“ I bring God’s light ; 
What gift have you ? ” 
Night said : “ The dew.” 
“ I give bright hours,” 
Quoth Day, “ and flowers ; ” 
Said Night : “ More blest, 
I bring sweet rest.” 
Mr. Norman R. Gale’s Country Muse is a welcome singer, and in this 
“new series ” (D. Nutt, 5s.), her strains are, if not sweeter than before, at least 
as fresh and true ; and this will be recognised by those who know her earlier 
warblings as no faint praise. The lines entitled “ The Country Faith ” strike us 
as verj' beautiful : — 
Here in the country’s heart 
Where the grass is green 
Life is the same sweet li.'e 
As it e’er hath been. 
Trust in a God still lives. 
And the bell at morn 
Floats with a thought of God 
O’er the rising corn. 
God comes down in the rain, 
And the crop grows tall — 
This is the country faith, 
And the best of all ! 
Here are two verses from “ My Cherry Trees” : — 
O children of the smoke and fog. 
With faces pinched by early care. 
Would God you might adventure forth 
To breathe this country air ! 
Would God your ears might drink the song 
Of grasses, birds, and singing trees ! 
Would God your eyes grew round to see 
My wealth of cherry-trees ! 
A hundred thousand shining lamps 
To light the glory of the green ! 
The rubies of my orchard hang 
The sturdy leaves between ; 
The blackbird pecks them at his will, 
The brazen sparrow with his beak 
Attacks some swaying globe of fruit 
And stabs its ruddy cheek. 
More Selbornian than any of the poems in this little volume, however, are the 
following lines to “ A Bird in the Hand,” with which we must conclude_tliis_too 
short notice : — 
