156 The Nature-Study Idea 



I like Bryant's lyric because it catches so 

 much of the life of a bobolink. A scientific 

 description could tell the facts better, but only 

 ornithologists read scientific descriptions. Yet 

 I have always wished that the poet had told the 

 whole story. After the breeding season is past, 

 the birds gather in flocks in the rice-fields and 

 reeds of the South and are then known as rice- 

 birds and reed-birds. In great numbers they 

 are slaughtered for the market, and thereby the 

 bobolink does not become an abundant species 

 in the North. May we not add: 



Far in the South he gathers his clans, 



Nor thinks of the regions of ice; 

 Too early yet for housekeeping plans, 

 He rev'ls and gluttons in fields of rice. 

 Rice-bird, bob-o'-link, 

 Spink, spank, spink; 

 Hunter is waiting under the bloom, 

 Robert of Lincoln falls to his doom. 

 Chee, chee, chee. 



Spring comes: swinging on brier and weed, 

 Near to the nest of his little dame, 



