PASSERES. ( 120 ) ORIOLIDM. 



THE GOLDEN OEIOLE. 



Oriolus galbula. 



The Blackbird and the Thrush, 

 The Golden Oriole, shall flit around, 

 And waken with a mellow gust of sound 



The forest solemn hush.^ 



Rossi^nols, Loriots, Fauvettes, 

 Merles, Bouvreuils, Linots, Pinsons, 

 Cidant au pouvoir de mes sons. 

 Tous, jusqu'auxfolles allouettes, 

 Venaicnt, pour prix de leicr chansons, 

 De mon pain bequeter Ics miettes. 



Beranger, Chansons. 



The Eev. Andrew Baird, who drew up the report on the 

 united parishes of Cockburnspath and Oldcambus for the 

 Nevj Statistical Account of Scotland in December 1834, 

 says : — " And many a bird of fair and foreign plumage is 



1 The Rev. AlexauderB. Grosart, in his Poems a7id Literary Prose of Alex- 

 ander Wilson, the American Ornithologist, gives an interesting engraving of 

 Wilson's tomb, which bears the following inscription : — " This monument 

 covers the remains of Alexander Wilson, author of American Ornithology. He 

 was born in Renfrewshire, Scotland, on 6th July 1766, migrated to the United 

 States in the year 1794, and died at Philadelphia of the dysentery on the 23rd 

 August 1813, aged 47." Mr. Grosart adds that a friend of his thus told the 

 cause of Wilson's illness :— " While he was sitting in the house of one of his 

 friends enjcying the pleasures of conversation, he chanced to see a bird of a rare 

 species, for one of which he had long been in search. With his usual enthusiasm, 

 he ran out, followed it, swam across a river over which it had flown, fired at, 

 killed, and obtained the object of his eager pursuit ; but caught a cold which, 

 bringing on dysentery, ended in his death." The above lines are from a verse- 

 rendering of Wilson's dying wish to be laid in some rural spot where the birds 

 might sing over his grave. — Poems and Literary Prose of Alexander Wilson, 

 the American Ornithologist, by the Rev. Alexander B. Grosart, 2 vols. 

 Paisley, 1876. 



