| |
| THE FARMER sat in his easy-chair, | |
| Smoking his pipe of clay, | |
| While his hale old wife, with busy care, | |
| Was clearing the dinner away; | |
| A sweet little girl, with fine blue eyes, | 5 |
| On her grandfather’s knee was catching flies. | |
| |
| The old man laid his hand on her head, | |
| With a tear on his wrinkled face; | |
| He thought how often her mother, dead, | |
| Had sat in the self-same place. | 10 |
| As the tear stole down from his half-shut eye, | |
| “Don’t smoke!” said the child; “how it makes you cry!” | |
| |
| The house-dog lay stretched out on the floor, | |
| Where the shade after noon used to steal; | |
| The busy old wife, by the open door, | 15 |
| Was turning the spinning-wheel; | |
| And the old brass clock on the mantel-tree | |
| Had plodded along to almost three. | |
| |
| Still the farmer sat in his easy-chair, | |
| While close to his heaving breast | 20 |
| The moistened brow and the cheek so fair | |
| Of his sweet grandchild were pressed; | |
| His head, bent down, on her soft hair lay: | |
| Fast asleep were they both, that summer day! | |
| |
