POETRY.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1892, 17 March 1880, Page 3

POETRY.

SUCH A LITTLE ONE. A fquad of regular infantry,' In the Commune's closing days, Had captured a crowd of rebels By the wall of Pere la Chaise. There were desperate men, wild women, And dork-eyed Amazon girls, And one little boy, rrith a peach-down cheek And yellow clustering curls. The captain seized the little waif, And said : " What dost thou here ?" " Sapristi, citizen captain! I'm a Communist, my dear!" " Very well. Then you die with the others!" " Very well. That's my affair, But first let me take to my mother, Who livss by the wine shop there, "My father's Tratch. You see it— A gay old thing, is it not ? It would please th 3 old lady to have it— Then I'll come back here and be shot." " That is the l*st we shall see of him," The grizzled captain grinned, As the little man skimmed down the hill Like a swallow down the wind. For the joy of killing had lost its zest In the glut of those awful days, And Death writhed, gorged like a greedy snake, From tho Arch of Pere la Chaise. But before the last platoon had fired The child's shrill voice was heard—- " Eoup-la! the old ■girl mode such a row, I feared I should break my word ! " Against the bullet-pitted wall He took his place with tho rest; A button was lost from his ragged blouse, Which showed hio soft white breast. •' N6w blaze away, my children, With your little one —two—three 1 " TheChßSsepots tore the stout young heart, And saved society. John Hat.