Birds, Insects, Man and Woman 107 



Birds, Insects, Man and Woman 



THE blossoms and leaves of summer are 

 rapidly filling the air with perfume and 

 the day with shade. Over our New 

 England hills and valleys, by the farm-houses and 

 in the villages, the lilacs have crowded close after 

 the cherries, peaches and pears ; they have had 

 their , day of bloom and are setting their fruit. 

 The apples also are gone by, after welcoming the 

 orioles and the robins ; the orioles no more dash 

 sportively amid the orchard masses of blossom, 

 but are already constructing their nests on the 

 pendent boughs of the elms. It is a day of birds, 

 the song sparrows by the roadside and the vesper 

 sparrows by the brooksides, the red-wings in the 

 marshy sedges, the bobolinks in the meadows, and 

 over all the crows, with their wise commentary 

 on our inferior and wicked contrivances which 

 they behold in the fields, ready against the coming 

 of the corn. The night-jar swings over our streets 

 and over farmers fields with equal vigilance, 

 screaming as it flies, after moths and chafers for 



