[Illustration: _"She walks among the meadow grass."_]
My bed is like a little boat; Nurse helps me in when I embark; She girds me in my sailor's coat And starts me in the dark.
At night, I go on board and say Good-night to all my friends on shore; I shut my eyes and sail away And see and hear no more.
And sometimes things to bed I take, As prudent sailors have to do; Perhaps a slice of wedding-cake, Perhaps a toy or two.
All night across the dark we steer; But when the day returns at last, Safe in my room, beside the pier, I find my vessel fast.
From breakfast on through all the day At home among my friends I stay, But every night I go abroad Afar into the Land of Nod.
All by myself I have to go, With none to tell me what to do-- All alone beside the streams And up the mountain-side of dreams.
The strangest things are there for me, Both things to eat and things to see, And many frightening sights abroad Till morning in the Land of Nod.
Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day, Nor can remember plain and clear The curious music that I hear.
Come up here, O dusty feet! Here is fairy bread to eat Here in my retiring room, Children, you may dine On the golden smell of broom And the shade of pine; And when you have eaten well, Fairy stories hear and tell.
Over the borders, a sin without pardon, Breaking the branches and crawling below, Out through the breach in the wall of the garden, Down by the banks of the river, we go.
Here is the mill with the humming of thunder, Here is the weir with the wonder of foam, Here is the sluice with the race running under-- Marvelous places, though handy to home!
Sounds of the village grow stiller and stiller, Stiller the note of the birds on the hill; Dusty and dim are the eyes of the miller, Deaf are his ears with the moil of the mill.
Years may go by, and the wheel in the river Wheel as it wheels for us, children, to-day, Wheel and keep roaring and foaming for ever-- Long after all the boys are away.
Home from the Indies and home from the ocean, Heroes and soldiers we all shall come home; Still we shall find the old mill wheel in motion, Turning and churning that river to foam.
You with the bean that I gave when we quarreled, I with your marble of Saturday last, Honored and old and all gaily appareled, Here we shall meet and remember the past.