of tradition. Some say that the wandering The 

 clan has dispersed on the four winds. The Cuckoo's 

 sweet mysterious voice will be heard no more * ence - 

 in the world till the wind of the south crosses 

 the sea next far-off Spring, and the sound of 

 the wings of swallows is come again. But 

 ' the bird of the sevens ' is not yet gone. 

 Seven weeks from the coming of the Voice 

 to the hunger of the fledgeling ; seventeen 

 weeks, and the fledgeling has left foster-parents 

 and gone out upon the wind ; seven and twenty 

 weeks, and the bird fades away from the wood- 

 lands like mist. 



It is gone : Midsummer, the songs of birds, 

 the 'wandering Voice.' Already, with that 

 old insatiate passion of the soul, we long for 

 Blathmaid, so soon taken from us : long for 

 that divine call to youth and love : long for 

 Spring that shall come again, though it shall 

 be but a sweet wandering voice, the call of the 

 unknown, the promise of the unfulfilled. For 

 we thirst for that invisible mystery whose voice 

 floats above the veils of the world, and we 

 would drink again of the old wonder and the 

 old illusion. 



i8 7 



