The Thrush. 75 



Life is dear to slave or free, 

 Life than liberty's more dear; 

 Shall I then find fault with thee 

 For partaking of the cheer 

 That thy masters to thee bring? 

 No; I'd sing — 



I'd sing, as thou art doing now, 

 Perhaps not quite so merrily, 

 But as well as I know how, 

 For alas ! I am not free. 

 Freedom ne'er shall I know more. 

 Ah ! Lenore ! 



Ah! Lenore! thou fickle maid! 

 Thou my heart hast captive ta'en, 

 And prisoned it in utter shade. 

 Where it must for aye remain. 

 If thou wilt not set it free, 

 By loving me. 



This bird has always been a favourite with the poets, and 

 if I were to collect all that they have written about him, I 

 should fill a good-sized volume: I cannot, however, refrain 

 from one more quotation, a sonnet by the village poet Clare. 



THE THRUSH'S NEST. 



Within a thick and spreading hawthorn bush, 

 That overhung a mole-hill large and round, 

 I heard from morn to morn a merry Thrush 

 Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound 

 With joy; and oft, an unintruding guest, 

 I watched her secret toils from day to day, 

 How true she wrapped the moss to form her nest, 

 And modelled it within with wool and clay. 

 And by and bye, like heath-bells gilt with dew. 

 There lay her shining eggs as bright as flowers. 

 Ink-spotted over, shells of green and blue; 

 And there I witnessed in the summer hours, 

 A brood of nature's minstrels chirp and fly. 

 Glad as the sunshine and the laughing sky. 



Clare. 



