Complete Works of L. Frank Baum
Page 877
“Some quail on toast for me.”
He:
“Mistress Mary, quite contrary,
What’ll you have to drink?
Some beer, my dear?”
She:
“Oh, no; how queer!
I’ll take champagne, I think.”
The Benedict may now be seen
Protesting to his Benedictine.
He’s Cornin’ thro’ the Rye, “that’s all — ”
Just listen to his loud, high bawl.
Of Bourbon ancestry is she;
She shakes him for the drinks, you see.
Many a good housemaid is sacrificed to
make a poor stenographer, while many
a good stenographer becomes a poor
actress. Ambition should be made of
sterner stuff.
Now doth the master of the house
With trembling fingers ope’
The bills for wifey’s Christmas gifts--
For he’s plumb out of soap.
“Everything comes to him who waits” —
Which means the man who juggles the plates
And thrusts the finger-bowl under your nose
And then assumes a haughty pose.
Pompous and dignified, graceful and flip
He eyes you with scorn as you feel for his tip.
Give him your all — appease the fates —
Everything goes to him who waits!
FEBRUARY
THIS is the month the bashful youth
Invests in valentines, forsooth —
All decked with cupids, hearts and lyres
To send the girl he most admires.
She gives the precious things a glance
Of scorn — perhaps of arrogance —
And hands them to her little brother
To send some school-girl friend or other.
The valentine does double duty —
Or triple, if it is a beauty;
So lovers, heed this wise advice:
Don’t buy the things at any price.
The Father of his Country
This very month, they say,
Was born, by some rare streak of luck,
On Washington’s birthday.
Abe Lincoln, too, that famous man,
(It’s quite extraordinary!)
Decided to be also born
The month of February!
So, children, don’t forget the dates-
This is the way they’re reckoned:
The fourteenth day for Abraham,
For George the twenty-second.
Shoe the wild colt
And shoo the wild hen;
But how in the world
Can you shoe eight or ten
Stubby-toed children
When poor daddy’s fate
Is to earn 12 a week
And the grocer won’t wait?
If someone would invent a speedometer to
attach to the modern female, we’d find
a good many of them are exceeding the
limit. This is a fine point to consider.
A skate is a fish;
But a “cheap skate” is not;
And to “get a skate on.”
Is the thirsty man’s lot.
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe,
She had so many children she didn’t know what to do.
She went to our Teddy, who cried: “You are it!
It’s a kid shoe, of course; when it’s full, it’s a fit.”
Uneasy lies the man that meets a creditor.
A dear Christian lady
Played bridge for a prize;
The way she reneged
Would cause you surprise.
When asked if she didn’t
Think “bridge” was a sin
She answered: “Oh, no;
For I prayed I would win!”
Give your old clothes to the Salvation
Army. Such charity covers a multitude of shins.
MARCH
This is the month old Boreas
Salutes the people as they pass.
His temper’s breezy now, you know;
He bores us with his constant blow.
The month comes like a lion grim
And fades away resembling him.
The wind’s not tempered to the shorn;
The ancient lamb-like days we mourn.
To keep gas bills from running up
I’ve found the nicest way
Is locking up the house at night
And going to the play.
“Curly Locks, Curly Locks, wilt thou be mine?
I’ll dine you on squab and a bottle of wine.”
Said the fair chorus girl: “Go propose to some other;
At home I’ve nine children awaiting their mother.”
Tramp, tramp, tramp, the month is
Marching,
Cheer up, folks, it cannot last;
All the drizzle, sleet and hail
They will vanish, without fail,
When the dreary, weary days have wildly passed.
Hush-a-bye, baby, on the tree-top;
Ma’s at the club, and so is your pop;
Nursey must get the policeman a lunch —
Hush-a-bye, baby, the tree-top’s your hunch!
Imitation is the life of trade.
March Seventeenth the Emerald Isle
Sends out her sons to march in style
In honor of St. Patrick, who
Was death on snakes and sinners too.
With shamrock pinned upon each breast
They tramp all day without a rest
And work much harder, sure, than they
Are sometimes known to do for pay.
Scientists, it is said, have discovered that
the girls with the prettiest faces have
the most corns on their toes. This may
be a slander, and if so any pretty girl
has the right to prove it.
Now Lent begins, and appetites
Should modulated be.
Deny yourself those dainty bits
That with you don’t agree.
Allow your friends to go to church,
And fast between-meals, too,
For if you’re wise, then you’ll keep Lent —
All good umbrellas do.
There’s a difference between Sousa’s
march air and the mad March hare. The
latter ought to go to a barber.
APRIL
ST. Fool’s Day comes but once a year —
We note with grief that now it’s here.
This is the day you dare not kick
The hat that hides the solid brick;
When salt is in the sugar-bowl
To fool us in a manner droll;
When imps pin signs upon your back
With “April Fool!” in letters black.
Perhaps the joke you fail to see;
If so, a fool you’re sure to be;
And every fool is at his worst
Upon this awful April first.
One misty, moisty morning,
When cloudy was the weather,
She wore her forty-dollar hat
And spoiled the ostrich feather.
Filosify.
The man who spends his all has fun;
The man who saves his all has none;
Yet it is best, the wise ones say,
To save some for a rainy day.
But, if ‘tis hard to save a bit,
And easy to spend all of it,
Just let’ er slide — the fun you’ll gain,
And like as not ‘twill never rain.
Fee, faw, fum!
The girls are chewing gum;
But never mind, when they are through
It’s probable the rag they’ll chew,
And I prefer the gum, don’t you?
Yum, yum, yum!
When the dentist extracted his ner
ve
He must have infused him with verve,
For he gave a great yell,
On his torturer fell,
And at the hospital they say Doc is
improving slowly.
“The girl I love is all my own!”
I heard a lover cry;
‘Tis sad that he could not have known
The girl he loved was all her own
And not composed of the rag and bone
And hank o’ hair that girls are prone
Of specialists to buy.
“April showers bring forth May flowers”;
But just depend upon it
The flowery things that April brings
Appear upon a bonnet.
Now doth the star, all broken down,
In vaudeville seek fresh renown.
The manager will advertise
He has secured a splendid prize —
Six hundred dollars every week
Is what he pays — to hear him speak.
The patrons swear that six would be
A bit of cruel robbery.
A poet is born, not made; but this fact may
not be wholly responsible for the prev-
alence of race suicide.
MAY
GREAT Cæsar! Moving-Day is here!
So from this flat we disappear
Into another, while from that
Our neighbors move into our flat.
We haven’t gained a blessed thing
By breaking up and taking wing,
And no one profits but the man
Who owns the costly moving-van.
(P. S. This janitor is somewhat worse
Than that one whom we used to curse.)
See, saw, Margery Daw,
Wanted to act on the stage.
She took elocution
At some institution —
At 5c. shows she’s now the rage.
She was the idol of my heart;
But since we’ve married been
She is the idle of our flat
And I’ve turned kitchen-queen!
Don’t judge a man by his clothes. Many a
cheap picture has an expensive frame.
There was a sign upon the fence.
The sign read this way:
And every person passing thence
Would pause, with manner quaint,
And touch a finger to the place —
Then wisely wag his head —
And as he journeyed on apace
“It’s paint, all right!” he said.
A word to the wise is unnecessary.
A SPRING TRAGEDY
Lovely, limber Lady Rake
Had the gardener’s bed to make
When at morning she’d arise —
‘Twas her daily exercise.
As she picked her way o’er the grass so gay
The tools all loved her, and they say
That the hammer lost his head,
And the anvil colored red,
Augur got to be a bore,
While the lawn adored her mower;
She refused the prying pick —
Made him dig out mighty quick Î
Hatchet was too sharp, by far,
So she gave his edge a jar;
But the spade, as you might guess,
Won from her a gracious “yes,”
A SPRING TRAGEDY. (Concluded.)
And the tweezers, passing by,
Bound them with a railway tie.
‘But though wed they say Lady Rake got gay
And conducted herself in an indiscreet way:
Scraped acquaintance with a file,
On a shovel dared to smile,
Danced around with sickle keen
Cutting capers on the green!
So the spade soon got divorce —
From the tennis-court, of course;
She’s a widow, now, alas!
Moral is: Keep off the Grass.
JUNE
This is the month the blushing bride
Before the altar stands with pride —
Her gown the sweetest ever seen,
Her girl friends all with envy green.
The groom as “model man” now poses;
The wedding feast is banked with roses;
Her pictures all the papers print,
And friends a thousand cautions hint.
Her papa thrills with nervous chills
To think that he must foot the bills;
And in another year, of course
He’ll have to pay for her divorce.
And now with manly resignation
The clerk goes on his long vacation
And “loafs” with such tremendous zest
He has to go to work to rest.
He’ll graduate now from Harvard or
Yale,
But there is n’t a thing he can do;
Though wisdom scholastic from him doth exhale
All labor he’ll proudly eschew.
With chin in the air he will strut here and there
And flirt with the girls and at business men stare,
But how he can live only Dad is aware
For there isn’t a thing he can do.
List, darling, to the auto’s toot —
It’s time for little ones to scoot.
The chauffeur fiend is after you
And loves to make you all skidoo;
He craves an arm, or leg, or head,
And smiles to think he’s got you dead.
The world was only made, they say,
For automobiles and chauffeurs gay.
The rich who ride demand our praises.
The poor who walk can go to blazes.
A treat in time saves wine.
A TERRIBLE TALE
A maiden once sailed on the briny deep —
A wide-awake girl when she wasn’t asleep;
The sea acted roughly, ‘twas rude and ‘twas wet,
And took a wild notion to fume and to fret
Till the ship and the girl were completely upset.
She floated ashore on a cannibal isle,
And the Cannibal King smole an amiable smile.
“I’ll give you your choice,” the savage one said,
“To be instantly married, or eaten, instead.”
“I reckon,” said she, “I prefer to be wed.”
A TERRIBLE TALE. (Concluded.)
Now the cannibal planned, when he tire of his bride,
To serve her for luncheon, sliced thin and then fried;
But the girl had a far better scheme in her head:
She baked him a batch of her Cooking-
School bread
And the cannibal’s spirit immediately fled —
He was dead.
All the world’s a stage, yet some folks
claim they have no show.
JULY
HUZZAH! Hurroo! Hip, hip, hooray!
The 4th is Independence Day.
The small boy now is much elated;
The population’s decimated;
Toes, fingers, eye-balls, scattered wide
Proclaim the day our Nation’s pride.
The Queen was tart;
She lost her heart
All on a summer’s day.
The thing, I’m told,
Was hard and cold
And worthless, anyway.
Hey, diddle, diddle,
If Ysaye would fiddle
While Rockefeller captured the moon
The people would say:
“It’s only his way;
He’ll have the sun, too, pretty soon.”
The proof of the printing has nothing
to do with the case.
Good morning, merry sunshine!
What makes you come so soon?
You lure us to the picnic grounds
And then it rains by noon.
And now restrain your envy when you find your neighbor can
&
nbsp; Go riding in an auto that is stylish, spick and span.
It doesn’t mean excessive wealth — in these days any man
May buy a great big auto on the small instalment plan.
Distance lends enchantment to the ball game.
Sing a song o’ ten cents,
A bottle full of rye,
A glass that holds a nickle’s worth,
A ball that’s rather high.
When the nozzle gurgles
The barkeep gives a frown —
Isn’t that a foolish drink
For any man to down?
It seems queer that an old bachelor would
buy a talking-machine. But then, he
isn’t obliged to wind it up.
THE OLD, OLD STORY
Now doth the busy little she
Employ each shining minute,
For at the sea-shore she can be
A star, and strictly in it.
Nor doth her bathing-togs disguise
The fact she seeks a chance
To flirt; and thus her soulful eyes
Some yearning youth entrance.
On moonlit sands they sit to rest
In dreamy satisfaction;
‘Tis sweet to hear the youth protest
He loves her to distraction.
To end this fond, idyllic spree
They both go home to work;
For she’s a lovely sales-ladye
And he’s a drug-store clerk.
AUGUST
THIS is the month so scorching hot
That even autos scorch a lot;
The boys all seek the swimming hole,
The girls to soda fountains stroll;
The merry ‘skeeters softly hum;
The ice-man’s not exactly glum;
The summer gardens all entice
You with a small admission price
And fleece you while inside you roam
Until you’re forced ta “hoof it” home.
‘Tis now the merry iceman
Is in a melting mood;
His frosty wares are full of glares
Which proves the ice is good.
His deals are always on the square,
He chips in constantly,
And every weight is what he’ll state
It is cracked up to be.
If a little learning is a dangerous thing,
more must be an automobile.
Silence is golden, so it takes money to keep
Mumm.
Sail-boat;
Boy afloat;
Sudden squall;
That’s all.
The Child:
“Why does our Teddy hunt bear, papa?
Why does our Teddy hunt bear?”
The Papa:
“Because, dear boy, as everyone knows,
He has to hunt bare ‘til he puts on his
clothes;
And that’s why our Teddy hunts bare, I