BRILLIANTS IN PLUMES. 147 



ing one dream over again all the old myths of the 

 sirens and sybils. I doubt if either Orpheus or 

 Ulysses would have been able to pass the fabled 

 isles if a company of warblers had been the 

 enchanting musicians. 



One of a speculative turn of mind cannot help 

 wondering why nature studs her most sequestered 

 nooks with these rare and beautiful brilliants. 

 Why does she not bejewel the trees of our cities 

 and public highways with such gorgeous creatures 

 to delight the common eye ? It would seem that 

 the most stolid and prosaic persons would feel a 

 thrill of sesthetic pleasure at sight of them. Per- 

 haps Emerson, in his lines to the recluse Rhodora, 

 gives the most plausible answer to this inquiry ; 

 at all events it is a poetical conception : 



" Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why 

 This charm is wasted on the marsh and sky, 

 Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, 

 Then beauty is its own excuse for being." 



No doubt other reasons might be assigned for 

 nature's oft-time unobtrusive moods and manners, 

 but there is something peculiarly tranquilizing in 

 resting content in the poet's conclusion ; for, say 



