The Purl Frog
We named these amiable amphibians Rosemarie and Hilaire, after the friendly neighbor who shared the pattern with us, and the author of the poem that accompanied the pattern. Rosemarie instructed us to use mung beans as the stuffing; the simple child's rhyme, composed by British author Hilaire Belloc, tells us how to treat our new friends:
The Frog
Be kind and tender to the Frog,
And do not call him names,
As "Slimy skin," or "Polly-wog,"
Or likewise "Ugly James,"
Or "Gap-a-grin," or "Toad-gone-wrong,"
Or "Bill Bandy-knees":
The Frog is justly sensitive
To epithets like these.
No animal will more repay
A treatment kind and fair,
At least so lonely people say
Who keep a frog (and by the way,
they are extremely rare).