GSV10-yeats-wren-text – Yellow Nineties 2.0

This hand-coloured illustration is centered above the poem’s text, occupying two-third of the page. It’s outlined in a thick black rectangular border, in portrait orientation. Four pale-skinned boys with rosy cheeks walk in the snow, singing. The foremost boy holds a tree branch decorated with red and blue cloths or ribbons; another plays the accordion or concertina. In the background are several white houses, black trees, and black birds. The sky is coloured pink. The artist’s signature is in the bottom right of the frame.

“The wren! the wren!
The king of all birds,
St. Stephen’s Day was caught in the furze,
So up with the kettle and down with the pan,
Your honour is a decent man.”

MLA citation:

Yeats, Jack B. Untitled [“The wren! The wren!”], traditional song illustrated by Jack B. Yeats. The Green Sheaf, No. 10, 1904, p. 2. Green Sheaf Digital Edition, edited by Lorraine Janzen Kooistra, Yellow Nineties 2.0, Toronto Metropolitan University Centre for Digital Humanities, 2022. https://1890s.ca/GSV10-yeats-wren-text/

magazine_texts The Green Sheaf 10 The wren! The wren! Jack B. Yeats 1904 Poetry