234 THE RUBY-CROWNED KINGLET. 



jn October. But under the incitement of the poet's playful banter the Kinglet 

 enlarges his claim : 



"Never king by right divine 

 Ruled a richer realm than mine ! 

 What are lands and golden crowns, 

 Armies, fortresses and towns, 

 Jewels, scepters, robes and rings, 

 What are these to song and wings ? 

 Everywhere that I can fly 

 There I own the earth and sky ; 

 Everywhere that I can sing 

 There I'm happy as a king." 



And surely there is no one who can meet this dainty monarch in one of 

 his happy moods without paying instant homage. His imperium is that of 

 the spirit, and those who boast a soul above the clod must swear fealty to this 

 most delicate expression of the creative Infinite, this thought of God made 

 luminous and vocal, and own him king by right divine. 



It was only yesterday I saw him, Easter day. The significant dawn was 

 struggling with great masses of heaped-up clouds, the incredulities and fears 

 of the world's night ; but now and again the invincible sun found some tiny 

 rift and poured a flood of tender gold upon a favored spot where stood some 

 solitary tree or expectant sylvan company. Along the river bank all was 

 still. There were no signs of spring save for the modest springing violet and 

 the pious buckeye, shaking its late-prisoned fronds to the morning air, and 

 tidily setting in order its manifold array of Easter candles. The oak trees 

 were gray and hushed, and the swamp elms held their peace until the fortunes 

 of the morning should be decided. Suddenly from down the river path there 

 came a tiny burst of angel music, the peerless song of the Ruby-crown. Pure, 

 ethereal, without hint of earthly dross or sadness, came those limpid, welling 

 notes, the sweetest and the gladdest ever sung at least by those who have 

 not suffered. It was not, indeed, the greeting of earth to the risen Lord, 

 but rather the annunciation of the glorious fact by heaven's own appointed 

 herald. 



The Ruby-crowned Kinglet has something of the nervousness and viva- 

 city of the typical Wren. It moves restlessly from twig to twig, flirting its 

 wings with a motion too quick for the eye to follow, and frequently uttering 

 a titter of alarm, chit-tit or chit-it-it. During migrations the birds swarm 

 through the tree-tops like Warblers, but are oftener found singly or in small 

 companies in thickets or open clusters of saplings. In such situations they 



