I called you bad my little child,
Upon this title page
Because the manner’s rude and wild
Is coming at your age.
The moral of this priceless work
Is rightly understood
Will make you – from a little Turk –
Unnaturally good.
Do not as evel children do,
Who on the slightest grounds
Will imitate the Kangaroo,
With wild unmeaning bounds.
Do not as children badly bred,
Who eat like little Hogs,
And when they have to go to bed
Will whine like Puppy Dogs:
Who take their manners from the Ape
Their habits from the Bear,
Indulge the loud unseemly jape,
And never brush their hair.
But so control your actions that
Your friends will all repeat,
“This child is danty as the Cat
And as the Owl discreet”.
*And is it true? It is not true!
And if it was it wouldn’t do
For people such as me and you
It isn’t true for me and you
Who very nearly all day long
Are doing something rather wrong.
Who very nearly all day long
Are doing something rather…
* ”Dedication Of A Child’s Book Of Imaginary Tales Wherein Wrong-Doers Suffer”
by Hilaire Belloc as well.
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