paraMse Ctrcle 



through the springtime air, like an ani- 

 mated flower whose sky-tinted petals had 

 become wings (meantime singing that most 

 memorable of all monotonies, now gone 

 forever from our Western country), and it 

 seemed to me a perfect example of an 

 embodied self-singing poem. 



But I had in mind bird-literature, not 

 birds themselves ; so I must not lose my- 

 self in the flood of avian reminiscences 

 which pours around me at the mention of 

 the vanished Sialia. Many a sylvan flute 

 was hushed before his. From the leaves 

 torn out of the stone-book we read a 

 strange tale. On those rude pages still 

 linger the sketches of birds extinct eons 

 ago. It was on my pen-nib to add that the 

 writings and drawings of Buff"on, Audubon, 

 and Wilson are almost as archaic as those 

 of the quarries. Looking over Audubon's 

 plates the other day, I was shocked to find 

 that they no longer touched my bird-nerve 

 as they once did ; and as for Wilson's, 

 what could be flatter or less alive than 

 his portraits of my favorite songsters? 



Turning from pictures to literature, we 

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