Rebecca Who Slammed Doors for Fun
And Perished Miserably
by Hilaire Belloc       (Public Domain)

A trick that everyone abhors
In little girls is slamming doors.
A wealthy banker’s little daughter
Who lived in Palace Green, Bayswater
(By name Rebecca Offendort),
Was given to this furious sport.
She would deliberately go
And slam the door like billy-o!
To make her Uncle Jacob start.
She was not really bad at heart,
But only rather rude and wild;
She was an aggravating child…
It happened that a marble bust
Of Abraham was standing just
Above the door this little lamb
Had carefully prepared to slam,
And down it came! It knocked her flat!
It laid her out! She looked like that.
Her funeral sermon (which was long
And followed by a sacred song)
Mentioned her virtues, it is true,
But dwelt upon her vices too,
And showed the dreadful end of one
Who goes and slams the door for fun.

Sarah Byng, Who Could Not Read and Was Tossed into a Thorny Hedge by a Bull

by Hilaire Belloc    (Public Domain)

Some years ago you heard me sing

My doubts on Alexander Byng.

His sister Sarah now inspires

My jaded Muse, my failing fires.

Of Sarah Byng the tale is told

How when the child was twelve years old

She could not read or write a line.

Her sister Jane, though barely nine,

Could spout the Catechism through

And parts of Matthew Arnold too,

While little Bill who came between

Was quite unnaturally keen

On 'Athalie', by Jean Racine.

But not so Sarah! Not so Sal!

She was a most uncultured girl

Who didn't care a pinch of snuff

For any literary stuff

And gave the classics all a miss.

Observe the consequence of this!

As she was walking home one day,

Upon the fields across her way

A gate, securely padlocked, stood,

And by its side a piece of wood

On which was painted plain and full,

BEWARE THE VERY FURIOUS BULL

Alas! The young illiterate

Went blindly forward to her fate,

And ignorantly climbed the gate!

Now happily the Bull that day

Was rather in the mood for play

Than goring people through and through

As Bulls so very often do;

He tossed her lightly with his horns

Into a prickly hedge of thorns,

And stood by laughing while she strode

And pushed and struggled to the road.

The lesson was not lost upon

The child, who since has always gone

A long way round to keep away

From signs, whatever they may say,

And leaves a padlocked gate alone.

Moreover she has wisely grown

Confirmed in her instinctive guess

That literature breeds distress.

George, Who Played with a Dangerous Toy 

and Suffered a Catastrophe of Considerable Dimensions 

by Hilaire Belloc   (Public Domain)
 
When George’s Grandmamma was told
That George had been as good as gold,
She promised in the afternoon
To buy him an Immense BALLOON.
And so she did; but when it came,
It got into the candle flame,
And being of a dangerous sort
Exploded with a loud report!
The lights went out! The windows broke!
The room was filled with reeking smoke.
And in the darkness shrieks and yells
Were mingled with electric bells,
And falling masonry and groans,
And crunching, as of broken bones,
And dreadful shrieks, when, worst of all,
The house itself began to fall!
It tottered, shuddering to and fro,
Then crashed into the street below—
Which happened to be Savile Row.

When Help arrived, among the Dead
Were Cousin Mary, Little Fred,
The Footmen (both of them), the Groom,
The man that cleaned the Billiard-Room,
The Chaplain, and the Still-Room Maid.
And I am dreadfully afraid
That Monsieur Champignon, the Chef,
Will now be permanently deaf—
And both his aides are much the same;
While George, who was in part to blame,
Received, you will regret to hear,
A nasty lump behind the ear.

Moral:
The moral is that little boys
Should not be given dangerous toys.