BEAUTIFUL BIRDS. 3 1 



BEAUTIFUL BIRDS. 



" Birds, birds ! ye are beautiful things, 



With your earth-treading feet, and your cloud-cleaving Avings. 



Where shall man wander, and where shall he dwell, 



Beautiful birds, that ye come not as well ? 



Ye have nests on the mountain all rugged and stark. 



Ye have nests in the forest all tangled and dark ; 



Ye build and ye brood 'neath the cottager's eaves, 



And ye sleep on the sod 'mid the bonnie green leaves ; 



Ye hide in the heatljer, ye lurk in the brake, 



Ye dive in the sweet-flags that shadow the lake ; 



Ye skim where the stream parts the orchard-decked land, 



Ye dance where the foam sweeps the desolate strand. 



Beautiful birds ! ye come thickly around 



When the bud's on the branch, and the snow's on the ground ; 



Ye come when the richest of roses flush out, 



And ye come when the yellow leaf eddies about. 



Beautiful birds ! how the schoolboy remembers 



The warblers that chorussed his holiday tune, — 



The robin that chirped in the frosty December, 



The blackbird that whistled through flower-crowned June. 



That schoolboy remembers his holiday ramble. 



When he pulled every blossom of palm he could see ; 



When his finger was raised as he stopped in the bramble, 



With ' Hark ! there's the cuckoo : how close he must be ! ' " 



