The Big Night Birds. (Marching Plays for Nursery and Kindergarten.)
Behold the round-eyed Owls!
The puffed-up feathery birds
That cry out in the night
And speak these two odd words:
Tu-whit, tu-whoo! tu-whit, tu-whoo!
Light scares these big-eyed birds;
They go and hide all day;
They sit in hollow trees;
Disturbed, they hiss and say:
Tu-whit, tu-whoo! tu-whit, tu-whoo!
But out they fly at night;
They come round many a house;
All noiselessly they sail,
A-watch for mole or mouse.
Tu-whit, tu-whoo! tu-whit, tu-whoo!
They never fly for joy,
And soar about the sky
They sail, and pounce, and sail—
These Owls with their strange cry:
Tu-whit, tu-whoo! tu-whit, tu-whoo!
Back to your hollow tree,
You birds that have no song!
No child would like to be
An Owl for very long.
Tu-whit, tu-whoo! tu-whit, tu-whoo!
“O, the bestest dood time I’ve had all alone,
A-playin’ wiv such a shiny black stone—
(Lilybud to mama.)
“But, mama! oh, mama! come quick—I dess,
I dess I have dot sumfin bad on my dwess!”
P. S. C.