XXII. 



FOREST MUSIC. 



The Woods, August 



O' 



Dear H- 



How often we speak of the solitude of the forest, 

 meaning by that, the contrast its stillness presents to 

 the hum and motion of busy life. "When you first 

 step from the crowded city into the centre of a vast 

 wilderness, the absence of all the bustle and activity 

 you have been accustomed to makes you at first be- 

 lieve there is no sound, no motion there. So a man 

 accustomed for a long time to the surges of the ocean 

 cannot at first hear the murmur of the rill. Yet these 

 solitudes are full of sound, aye, of rare music, too. 

 I do not mean the notes of birds, for they rarely sing 

 in the darker, deeper portions of the forest. Even the 

 robin, which in the fields cannot chirp and carol 

 enough, and is so tame that a tyro can shoot him, 



