Leonora Pease, Dollies in Happy Land
(also published as Play Dollies; and as Four and Twenty Dollies, illus. Ella Dolbear Lee, Chicago, 1914).There once was a queer little man The Little Jap Man
Who hailed from the Isles of Japan,
Devised of the arts that beguile;
His quaint, biased eyes
Had a lift of surprise
And he smiled a suave, Japanese smile. This odd little almond-eyed man
Wore a fine paper gown from Pilan,
Embroidered in celestial style,
Red, yellow, and blue,
And a cute wooden shoe,
All along with his Japanese smile. This wise little far-eastern man,
Who smiled with the smile of Japan,
Some etiquette tracts should compile:
For to witness his bow
Raised the question of "how",
And artful and fluent his smile.This accomplished and deft little man
This fierce little man formed a plan
Contrived to swallow a fan,
Executing his sly tricks the while,
And a dragon Chinese,
Which he did with much ease,
While he bowed with his affecting smile.
To gobble along with his fan,
What his ample digestion might rile.
With a nature pugnacious,
People said, "O my gracious!
To think of his amiable smile."Miss Antoinette Marie, Miss Antoinette Marie
Of the fashions of Parie,
Over her fan at the Japanese man,
With her paper eyes--it is our sumise--
Looked in her innocent paper way;
Never considered what folks would say:
Glanced up at him and then glanced down
To the hem of her modish paper gown;
Smiled a coquettish paper smile,
Under her hat of the latest style,
Over her painted paper fan,
Into the eyes of the Japanese man. The little Japanese,
Of manner quite at ease,
At the lady fair of the paper hair
With his almond eyes--it is our surmise--
Gazed in his bland, oriental wa,
And of what folks thought or dolls would say
He wasn't aware, or he didn't care,
Absorbed in the lady's paper snare;
All he would do was to humbly woo
Tha paper doll the whole day through,
Smile and bow and gaze would he
Straight at Miss Antoinette Marie.
