Suggestive programs for special day exercises/Labor Day/Working and Shirking

by Jason Elmer Hammond

WORKING AND SHIRKING.

ANTONY E. ANDERSON.

 
A grasshopper met a bumble bee
  In a field of sweet red clover;
“Oh, why this flurry and haste?” cried he,
  “I’ve brought my fiddle along with me;
Let’s dance till the summer’s over!”

“I’m gathering stores for the winter time,”
  The bee cried over his shoulder;
“I like your fiddling, it is sublime;
  But, living here, in this changeable clime,
I must think of days that are colder.”
 
The grasshopper laughed in a mocking way.
  As gaily he flourished his fiddle;
A troop of butterflies, merry and gay.
  Danced in a ring through the livelong day,
While the grasshopper stood in the middle.

The bumblebee, too, was fond of a dance.
  And the day was hot for working;
But he never gave them a second glance.
  And hastened away (if near them by chance)
For he knew the danger of shirking!

He gathered his stores thro’ the sunny hours,
  And felt that his pleasures were coming;
He knew that soon there would be no flowers,
  He knew that in winter the cold sky lowers,
And he kept up a cheerful humming.
 
The cold winds came and the days grew dark.
  And frozen were flower and berry;
The fiddler and dancers lay stiff and stark,
  In lonely graves with never a mark—
But the wise little bee made merry!