BIRDS AT THEIR BEST 35 



my mind, as if some person sitting invisible at my 

 side and thinking them opposite to the subject had 

 whispered them into my ear. They are lines ad- 

 dressed to the Merrimac River by an American 

 poet whether a major or minor I do not know, 

 having forgotten his name. In one stanza he 

 mentions the fact that " young Brissot " looked 

 upon this stream in its bright flow 



And bore its image o'er the deep 



To soothe a martyr's sadness, 

 And fresco in his troubled sleep 



His prison walls with gladness. 



Brissot is not generally looked upon as a " martyr " 

 on this side of the Atlantic, nor was he allowed to 

 enjoy his " troubled sleep " too long after his fellow- 

 citizens (especially the great and sea-green Incor- 

 ruptible) had begun in their fraternal fashion to 

 thirst for his blood ; but we can easily believe that 

 during those dark days in the Bastille the image and 

 vision of the beautiful river thousands of miles away 

 was more to him than all his varied stores of know- 

 ledge, all his schemes for the benefit of suffering 

 humanity, and perhaps even a better consolation 

 than his philosophy. 



It is indeed this " gladness " of old sunshine 

 stored within us if we have had the habit of seeing 



