Jack Frost and the Caty-did

I heard — 't was on an Autumn night —
A little song from yonder tree;
'T was a Caty-did, in the branches hid,
And thus sung he:

"Fair Caty sat beside yon stream,
Beneath the chestnut tree;
Each star sent forth its brightest gleam,
And the moon let fall her softest beam
On Caty and on me.

"And thus she wished — 'O, could I sing
Like the little birds in May,
With a satin breast and a silken wing,
And a leafy home by this gentle spring,
I'd chirp as blithe as they.

"' The Frog in the water, the Cricket on land,
The Night-hawk in the sky,
With the Whip-poor-will should be my band,
While gayly by the streamlet's sand,
The Lightning-bug should fly.'

" Her wish is granted — Off she flings
The robes that her beauty hid;
She wraps herself in her silken wings,
And near me now she sits and sings,
And tells what Caty did."

A beam from the waning moon was shot,
Where the little minstrel hid,
A cobweb from the cloud was let,
And down I boldly slid.

A hollow hailstone on my head,
For a glittering helm was clasped,
And a sharpened spear, like an icicle clear,
In my cold little fingers was grasped.

Silent, and resting on their arms,
I viewed my forces nigh,
Waiting the sign on earth to land,
Or bivouac in the sky.

From a birchen bough, which yellow turned
Beneath my withering lance;
I pointed them to that glassy pool,
And silently they advanced.

The water crisped beneath their feet
It never felt their weights;
And nothing but the rising sun,
Showed traces of their skates.

No horn I sounded, no shout I made,
But I lifted my vizor lid,
My felt-shod foot on the leaf I put,
And killed the Caty-did.

Her song went down the southern wind,
Her last breath up the stream;
But a rustling branch is left behind,
To fan her wakeless dream.