A Child's Garden of Verses

For the long nights you lay awake And watched for my unworthy sake: For your most comfortable hand That led me through the uneven land: For all the story-books you read: For all the pains you comforted: For all you pitied, all you bore, In sad and happy days of yore:-- My second Mother, my first Wife, The angel of my infant life-- From the sick child, now well and old, Take, nurse, the little book you hold!

And grant it, Heaven, that all who read May find as dear a nurse at need, And every child who lists my rhyme, In the bright, fireside, nursery clime, May hear it in as kind a voice As made my childish days rejoice!

R. L. S.