THE TOYS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XXXI, Issue 107, 11 May 1896, Page 2

THE TOYS.

4 " Nemo," m the Dunedin Star writes : — "While I am on the subject of children, let me say that . l pity the creature, who would not be touched with the following lines. They are from Coventry Patmore, a man who had the strangest threads of pathos and humor crossing and reorossing m his genius. The lines are part of a little poem called « The Toys' : — My little bod, who look'd from thoughlfu eyea, And moved and spoke m quiet grown-up wise, Having my law (be seventh time dijobey'd, I Btruok him, and dismiss'd With hard words and unkiss'd ; flia mother, who was patient, being dead. Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleop, I visited his bed, But found him slumbering deep, With darken'd eyelids, and their laib.es yet From his late sobbing wet. And I, with moan, Kissing away his tears, left othera of my own ; For on a table drawn beside his head, He had put, within his re-ota, A box of counters and a red-vein'd stone, A pieoe of glass abraded by the b6aoh And sis or seven shells, A bottle with bluebells, And two Frenoh oopper ooine, rang'd there with careful art To comfort his sad heart. Am I merely a soft-hearted man, or is there something exquisitely pathetic m the picture of the poor motherless child trying to comfort himself m his sorrow with the sight of the poor? treasures gathered from land and sea. And then, how priceless to the parent do these same treasures become — the counters, the red-veined stone, the glass, the shells, and the coins — when the hand that ranged them out m pride shall glory over them no more 1 And what a fate is theirs, to be sure, who have no appreciation of poetry !