10
"Twenty-five pair of fowls--now how shameful it is,
That I can't reckon up as much money as this!
Well, there's no use in trying; so let's give a guess;
I will say twenty pounds, and _it can't be no less_.
"Twenty pounds, I am certain, will buy me a cow,
Thirty geese, and two turkeys--eight pigs and a sow;
Now if these turn out well, at the end of the year,
I shall fill both my pockets with guineas 'tis clear.
"Then I'll bid that old tumble-down hovel good-bye;
My mother she'll scold, and my sisters they'll cry:
But I won't care a crow's egg for all they can say;
I sha'n't go to stop with such beggars as they!"
But forgetting her burden, when this she had said,
The maid superciliously toss'd up her head
When alas! for her prospects--the milk pail descended!
And so all her schemes for the future were ended.
MORAL.
This moral, I think, may be safely attach'd:
Reckon not on your chickens before they are hatch'd.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE LARK AND HER YOUNG ONES.
A lark who had her nest conceal'd,
Says Esop, in a barley field;
Began, as harvest time drew near,
The reaping of the corn to fear;
Afraid they would her nest descry,
Before her tender brood could fly.
She charged them therefore every day,
Before for food she flew away,
To watch the farmer in her stead,
And listen well to all he said.
It chanced one day, she scarce was gone,
Ere the farmer came and his son.
The farmer well his field survey'd,
And sundry observations made;
At last, "I'll tell you what," said he,
"This corn is fit to cut, I see;
But we our neighbor's help must borrow,
So tell them we begin to-morrow."
Just after this the lark returned,
When from her brood this news she learned.
"Ah! dearest mother," then, said they,
"Pray, let us all begone to-day."
"My dears," said she, "you need not fret,