96 NATURE AND THE POETS. 



*"T is a woodland enchanted; 

 By no sadder spirit 

 Than blackbirds and thrushes 

 That whistle to cheer it, 

 All day in the brushes." 



The blackbird of the English poets is like oui 

 robin in everything except color. He is familiar 

 hardy, abundant, thievish, and his habits, manners, 

 and song recall our bird to the life. Our own na- 

 tive blackbirds, the crow blackbird, the rusty grackle, 

 the cow-bird, and the red-shouldered starling, are not 

 songsters, even in the latitude allowable to poets ; 

 neither are they whistlers, unless we credit them with 

 a " split-whistle," as Thoreau does. The two first 

 named have a sort of musical cackle and gurgle in 

 spring (as at times both our crow and jay have), 

 which is very pleasing, and to which Emerson aptly 

 refers in these lines from " May-Day " : 



" The blackbirds make the maples ring 

 With social cheer and jubilee " 



but it is not a song. The note of the starling in the 

 trees and alders along the creeks and marshes is bet- 

 ter calculated to arrest the attention of the casual 

 observer ; but it is far from beiirg a song or a whistle 

 like that of the European blackbird, or our robin. 

 Its most familiar call is like the word "bazique," 

 "bazique" but it has a wild musical note which 

 Emerson has embalmed in this line : 

 " The red-wing flutes his o-ka-lee." 

 Here Emerson discriminates ; there is no mistaking 



