LITTLE BOY BLUE

Alfred Noyes

Little Boy Blue, come blow up your horn,
Summon the day of deliverance in;
We are weary of bearing the burden of scorn,
As we yearn for the home that we never shall win;
For here there is weeping and sorrow and sin,
And the poor and the weak are a spoil for the strong!
Ah! when shall the song of the ransomed begin?
The world is grown weary with waiting so long.
Little Boy Blue, you are gallant and brave,
There was never a doubt in those clear bright eyes:
Come, challenge the grim dark Gates of the Grave
As the skylark sings to those infinite skies!
This world is a dream, say the old and the wise,
And its rainbows arise o’er the false and the true
But the mists of the morning are made of our sighs,—
Ah, shatter them, scatter them, Little Boy Blue!
Little Boy Blue, if the child-heart knows,
Sound but a note as a little one may,
And the thorns of the desert shall bloom with the rose,
And the Healer shall wipe all tears away;
Little Boy Blue, we are all astray,
The sheep’s in the meadow, the cows in the corn,
Ah, set the world right, as a little one may;
Little Boy Blue, come blow up your horn!

THE END

FOOTNOTES

[1] By special permission of Pilgrim Press.

[2] From “A Little Book of Profitable Tales,” by Eugene Field, copyright 1889; published by Charles Scribner’s Sons.

[3] Taken from “The Child’s Book of Saints,” by permission of the publishers, E. P. Dutton & Co.

[4] By special permission The Oxford Press, London.

[5] By special permission The Pilgrim Press.

[6] By courtesy of The Ben. H. Sanborn Co.

[7] By special permission of Charles Scribner’s Sons.

[8] From “School Reading by Grades, Third Year,” by James Baldwin. Copyright American Book Co.

[9] Courtesy of Milton Bradly Co. From “More Mother Stories.”

[10] “The Little Brown Wren,” by Clinton Scollard.

[11] By courtesy of the author.

[12] From “Pyle’s Prose and Verse For Children.” Copyright 1899, by Katherine Pyle, American Book Co.

[13] By permission of The Macmillan Co.

[14] Found in England.

[15] From “Why the Chimes Rang,” by Raymond MacDonald Alden. Copyright 1908. Used by special permission of The Bobbs-Merrill Co.

[16] Reprinted by permission. Copyright 1908, by Henry Holt & Co.

[17] By special permission. Copyright 1910, Little, Brown Co.

[18] By permission. Copyright 1889, by Harper & Brothers.