The Sheep

"Lazy sheep, pray tell me why

In the pleasant fields you lie,

Eating grass, and daisies white,

From the morning till the night?

Everything can something do,

But what kind of use are you?"

"Nay, my little master, nay,

Do not serve me so, I pray;

Don't you see the wool that grows

On my back, to make you clothes?

Cold, and very cold, you'd be

If you had not wool from me.

True, it seems a pleasant thing,

To nip the daisies in the spring;

But many chilly nights I pass

On the cold and dewy grass,

Or pick a scanty dinner, where

All the common's brown and bare.

Then the farmer comes at last,

When the merry spring is past,

And cuts my woolly coat away,

To warm you in the winter's day:

Little master, this is why

In the pleasant fields I lie."