Merry Bell

Our Bell is just the funniest girl,
    So merry, sweet, & simple;
A Frolic hides in every curl,
    And peeps from every dimple.

A Four-year-old with flaxen hair,
    And eyes that droop demurely
Just when the very mischief’s there
    Most active & most surely.

A mouth as red as wild-brier hips,
    And cheeks as plump as peaches,
With laughs & kisses on her lips,
    And such old-fashioned speeches!

She teases Bub till cheek & lip
    Gloom cloudily together,
And just before the cloud should drip
    She kisses back fair weather.

She thinks a quirk in Tabby’s tail
    Artistic as in Piggy’s,
But tape & curling-papers fail,
    Puss wondering what the rig is!

The glasses “Dran-mamma fordots,”
    When she went home to Heaven,
She tries to Jip, with Dr. Watts’
    Hymn Tenth, at page eleven!

She’s been to church & Sunday School,
    To funerals & a wedding,
And sat as pensive as an owl,
Her tears with weepers shedding.

But oh, the little thoughtless minx!
She’ll mimic all that’s sacred;
The Elder’s awful words she thinks
    Are nothing but a play creed.

She decks herself in dusky weeds,
    And puts a solemn face on,
And then her thinking Tabby leads
    And plunges in the basin

Short rite she speaks, & nought besides,
    “Now Pussy I cap-size you!”
Before the candidate backslides
    To “sprinkling” as she flies you!

She gathers vials, cup & spoon,
    And doctors Dolly grimly;
Then, undertakes, has her room
    Laid starkly out, & trimly.

She digs a grave among the chips,
    A bread-pan in her ‘casket,’
And desolate in eye & lips
    Consigns her to the basket.

With Buddy’s trumpet little Bell
    Then blows you to distraction, 
And says, “Mamma, I’m Gaber-el, 
    I come to Ezra-lection!”

Before Mamma can say “Tut, tut!”
    And give her arm a nudge meant
Far check, she has her dolly out
    And whisked away to Judgement.

She sets up little Black & Tan,
    And Puss in white beside him,
And says, “I ‘nounce ye married man
    And wife!” when she has tied ‘em.

She claps her hands when Robin sings,
    And chirps to Bob-o-Lincoln;
She says to white clouds, “Dran’ma’s wings!”
    To lightning, “Dad’s a-winking!”

She loves so, everything alike,
    We never can refine her;
She gives her cake to little Mike!
    And kisses “Aunty Dinah!”

What shall we do with Merry Bell,
    So simple sweet & tender?
Ah me, the Love that gone can tell,
    Can guide her & defend her!