294 BIRDS OF THE NIGHT. 



We stroll by moonlight in the dusky forest 



Where the tall cypress shields thee, fervent chorist ! 



And sit in haunts of echoes when thou pourest 



Thy woodland solo. 

 Hark ! from the next green tree thy song commences ; 

 Music and discord join to mock the senses, 

 Repeated from the tree-tops and the fences, 



From hill and hollow ! 



A hundred voices mingle with thy clamor ; 

 Bird, beast, and reptile take part in thy drama ; 

 Outspeak they all in turn without a stammer, — 



Brisk Polyglot ! 

 Voices of kill-deer, plover, duck, and dotterel ; 

 Notes, bubbling, hissing, mellow, sharp, and guttural, 

 Of catbird, cat, or cart-wheel, thou canst utter all, 



And all untaught. 



The raven's croak, the chirrup of the sparrow, 

 The jay's harsh note, the creaking of a barrow, 

 The hoot of owls, all join the soul to harrow 



And grate the ear. 

 We listen to thy quaint soliloquizing, 

 As if all creatures thou wert catechizing, 

 Tuning their voices, and their notes revising 



From far and near. 



Sweet bird, that surely lovest the "noise of folly," 

 Most musical, but never melancholy ; 

 Disturber of the hour that should be holy, 



With sounds prodigious ; — 

 Fie on thee ! O thou feathered Paganini ! 

 To use thy little pipes to squawk and whinny, 

 And emulate the hinge and spinning-jenny, 



Making night hideous. 



Provoking melodist ! why canst thou breathe us 

 No thrilling harmony, no charming pathos, 

 No cheerful song of love, without a bathos ? 



The Furies take thee ! 

 Blast thy obstreperous mirth, thy foolish chatter, — 

 Gag thee, exhaust thy breath, and stop thy clatter, 

 And change thee to a beast, thou senseless prater ! 



Naught else can check thee ! 



