IV _She_ was a cook, I can tell you! And after we got ahead, And she could 'a' had a girl to do the cookin' instead, I had the greatest time to get Momma to leave the work; She said it made her feel like a mis'able sneak and shirk. She didn't want daughter, though, when we did begin to keep girls, To come in the kitchen and cook, and smell up her clo'es and curls; But you couldn't have stopped the child, whatever you tried to do-- I reckon the gift of the cookin' was born in Girly, too. Cook she would from the first, and we just had to let her alone; And after she got married, and had a house of her own, She tried to make me feel, when I come to live with her, Like it was my house, too; and I tell you she done it, sir! She remembered that breakfast was my best meal, and she tried To have all I used to have, and a good deal more beside; Grape-fruit to begin with, or melons or peaches, at least-- Husband's business took him there, and they had went to live East-- Then a Spanish macker'l, or a soft-shell crab on toast, Or a broiled live lobster! Well, sir, I don't want to seem to boast, But I don't believe you could have got in the whole of New York Any such an oyster fry or sausage of country pork. V Well, I don't know what-all it means; I always lived just so-- Never drinked or smoked, and yet, here about two years ago, I begun to run down; I ain't as young as I used to be; And the doctors all said Carlsbad, and I reckon this is me. But it's more like some one I've dreamt of, with all three of 'em gone! Believe in ghosts? Well, _I_ do. I _know_ there are ghosts. I'm _one_. Maybe I mayn't look it--I was always inclined to fat; The doctors say that's the trouble, and very likely it's that. This is my little grandson, and this is the oldest one Of Girly's girls; and for all that the whole of us said and done, She must come with grandpa when the doctors sent me off here, To see that they didn't starve him. Ain't that about so, my dear? _She_ can cook, I tell you; and when we get home again We're goin' to have something to _eat_; I'm just a-livin' till then. But when I set here of a morning, and think of them that's gone-- Mother and Momma and Girly--well, I wouldn't like to let on Before the children, but I can almost seem to see All of 'em lookin' down, like as if they pitied me, After the breakfasts they give me, to have me have to put up With nothing but bread and butter, and a little mis'able cup Of this here weak-kneed coffee! I can't tell how _you_ feel, But it fairly makes me sick! Breakfast is my best meal. X THE MOTHER-BIRD