| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900. |
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| 901. Mother Goose Sonnets |
| | | By Harriet S. Morgridge |
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JACK AND JILL
AH, Jack it was, and with him little Jill, | |
| Of the same age and size, a neighbor’s daughter, | |
| Who on a breezy morning climbed the hill | |
| To fetch down to the house a pail of water. | |
| Jack put his best foot foremost on that day,— | 5 |
| Vaulting ambition we have seen before,— | |
| He stepped too far, of course, and soon he lay | |
| In the vile path, his little crown so sore! | |
| The next act in the tragedy was played | |
| By Jill, whose eager foothold, too, was brief. | 10 |
| Epitome of life, that boy and maid | |
| Together hoped, together came to grief. | |
| And in their simple story lies concealed | |
| The germ of half that ’s plucked in fiction’s field. | |
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SIMPLE SIMON
A BOY named Simon sojourned in a dale; | 15 |
| Some said that he was simple, but I ’m sure | |
| That he was nothing less than simon pure; | |
| They thought him so because, forsooth, a whale | |
| He tried to catch in Mother’s water-pail. | |
| Ah! little boy, timid, composed, demure,— | 20 |
| He had imagination. Yet endure | |
| Defeat he could, for he of course did fail. | |
| But there are Simons of a larger growth, | |
| Who, too, in shallow waters fish for whales, | |
| And when they fail they are “unfortunate.” | 25 |
| If the small boy is simple, then are both, | |
| And the big Simon more, who often rails | |
| At what he calls ill luck or unkind fate. | |
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