THE SPRING BEAUTIES

The Puritan Spring Beauties stood freshly clad for church;

A Thrush, white-breasted, o'er them sat singing on his perch.

“Happy be! for fair are ye!” the gentle singer told them,

But presently a buff-coat Bee came booming up to scold them.

“Vanity, oh, vanity!

Young maids, beware of vanity!”

Grumbled out the buff-coat Bee,

Half parson-like, half soldierly.

The sweet-faced maidens trembled, with pretty, pinky blushes,

Convinced that it was wicked to listen to the Thrushes;

And when, that shady afternoon, I chanced that way to pass,

They hung their little bonnets down and looked into the grass,

All because the buff-coat Bee

Lectured them so solemnly:—

“Vanity, oh, vanity!

Young maids, beware of vanity!”