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LIVING CREATURES. 



English Sky-lark. 



Americans are usu- 

 ally disappointed when 

 they first hear the sky- 

 lark and the nightin- 

 gale. They think our 

 own great singers have 

 finer voices, though 

 we have fewer great 

 poets to extol them. 

 The sky-lark sings 

 while it soars, and pours its notes down upon the ear, 

 when itself has risen out of sight. Hence Shakespeare 

 says: 



"Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings." 



And Tennyson adds: 



"And drowned in yonder living blue,. 

 The lark becomes a sightless song." 



With the first warm breath of summer, our wood 

 thrush, with reddish back and mottled breast, plays 

 his flute, sweet and * 



clear, in rising and fall- 

 ing measures. 



And we have our 

 nightingale, or night- 

 singer the Southern 

 mocking-bird. His 



best song is in the 

 woods, where Long- 

 fellow finds him sing- 



. . . - r Mocking-bird. 



ing to the sad heart of 



Evangeline in search of her lover in the wild South-west : 



