NATURE AND THE POETS. 97 



his blackbird this time for the European species, 

 though it is true there is nothing fluty or flute-like 

 in the red-wing's voice. The flute is mellow, while 

 the " o-Jca-lee" of the starling is strong and shavply 

 accented. The voice of the thrushes (and our robin 

 and the European blackbird are thrushes) is flute- 

 like. Hence the aptness of this line of Tennyson : 



" The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm," 



the blackbird being the ouzel, or ouzel-c(5ck, as 

 Shakespeare calls him. 



In the line which precedes this, Tennyson has 

 stamped the cuckoo : 



u To left and right, 

 The cuckoo told his name to all the hills." 



The cuckoo is a bird that figures largely in English 

 poetry, but he always has an equivocal look in Amer- 

 ican verse, unless sharply discriminated. We have a 

 cuckoo, but he is a great recluse, and I am sure the 

 poets do not know when he comes or goes, while to 

 make him sing familiarly like the British species, as 

 I have known at least one of our poets to do, is to 

 come very wide of the mark. Our bird is as solitary 

 and joyless as the mos f veritable anchorite. He con- 

 tributes nothing to the melody or gayety of the sea- 

 son. He is indeed known in some sections as the 

 " rain-crow " ; but I presume that not one person in 

 ten of those who spend their lives in the country has 

 ever seen or heard him. He is like the showy orchis, 

 or the ladies'-slipper, or the shooting-star among 



