IT’S HO for the holly and laughter and kisses,

Into something all the while where you shouldn’t be,Prying into matters that are not for you to see;Little Master Mischievous, order’s overthrownIf your mother leaves you for a minute all alone.Little Master Mischievous, opening every door,Spilling books and papers round about the parlor floor,Scratching all the tables and marring all the chairs,Climbing where you shouldn’t…

They bring the bitterest cares we know, their mothers’ sharpest pain,Then smile our world to loveliness, like sunshine after rain.The children make us what we are; the childless king is spurned;The children send us to the hills where glories may be earned;For them we pledge our lives to strife, for them do mothers fade,And count…

Were all there is to human toil,If death were really death,And never should the soul ariseA finer world to see,How foolish would our struggles seem,How grim the earth would be!If living were the whole of life,To end in seventy years,How pitiful its joys would seem!How idle all its tears!There’d be no faith to keep us…

Bending o’er you every minute, and a pocketful of gold,An’ as much of love an’ gladness as a human heart can hold.Coz I know beyond all question that if such a thing could beAs you cornerin’ life’s riches you would share ’em all with me.I am selfish in my wishin’ every sorrow from your way,With…

‘Tain’t the birds that I’m out to killThat furnish me with the finest thrill,‘Cause I never worry or fret a lot,Or curse my luck if I miss a shot.There’s many a time, an’ I don’t know why,That I shoot too low or I aim too high,An’ all I can see is the distant whirrOf a…

An’ all that’s left for mother an’ for me till life is throughIs to sit an’ tell each other what the children used to do.We couldn’t keep ’em always an’ we knew it from the start;We knew when they were babies that some day we’d have to part.But the years go by so swiftly, an’…