Fourth Grade Read Aloud Banquet

A Bird Came Down the Walk

A bird came down the walk:

He did not know I saw;

He bit an angle-worm in halves

And ate the fellow, raw.


And then he drank a dew

From a convenient grass,

And then hopped sidewise to the wall

To let a beetle pass.


He glanced with rapid eyes

That hurried all abroad,

They looked like frightened beads, I thought;

He stirred his velvet head


Like one in danger; cautious,

I offered him a crumb,

And he unrolled his feathers

And rowed him softer home


Than oars divide the ocean,

Too silver for a seam,

Or butterflies, off banks of noon,

Leap, plashless, as they swim.

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Week 4 The Engine-Burglar from The Railway Children by Edith Nesbit Edward IV—Queen Margaret and the Robbers from Our Island Story by H. E. Marshall The Cows from The Story Book of Science by Jean Henri Fabre The White Cross on the Hill from Otto of the Silver Hand by Howard Pyle The Greatness of France from The Awakening of Europe by M. B. Synge Rocking-Horse Land from Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss—Upon the Rock by Lisa M. Ripperton The Star and the Wise Men from Hurlbut's Story of the Bible by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut
The Teutons and Their Myths from Heroes of the Middle Ages by Eva March Tappan A Chapter of Things To See This Winter from Winter by Dallas Lore Sharp John Cabot from Builders of Our Country: Book I by Gertrude van Duyn Southworth The Ox Who Won the Forfeit from Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt Sif's Golden Hair: How Loki Wrought Mischief in Asgard from The Children of Odin: A Book of Northern Myths by Padraic Colum Familiar Butterflies from Insect Life by Arabella B. Buckley Wings from Five Children and It by Edith Nesbit
Beautiful Things by Jane Taylor Epitaph on a Hare by William Cowper A Book by Emily Dickinson A Farewell by Charles Kingsley Norse Lullaby from Poems by Eugene Field Eletelephony by Laura E. Richards A Song for My Mother: Her Hands by Anna Hempstead Branch
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The Aesop for Children  by Milo Winter

The Lion, the Ass, and the Fox

A Lion, an Ass, and a Fox were hunting in company, and caught a large quantity of game. The Ass was asked to divide the spoil. This he did very fairly, giving each an equal share.

The Fox was well satisfied, but the Lion flew into a great rage over it, and with one stroke of his huge paw, he added the Ass to the pile of slain.

Then he turned to the Fox.

"You divide it," he roared angrily.

The Fox wasted no time in talking. He quickly piled all the game into one great heap. From this he took a very small portion for himself, such undesirable bits as the horns and hoofs of a mountain goat, and the end of an ox tail.


[Illustration]

The Lion now recovered his good humor entirely.

"Who taught you to divide so fairly?" he asked pleasantly.

"I learned a lesson from the Ass," replied the Fox, carefully edging away.

Learn from the misfortunes of others.