A BIRD ANTHOLOGY PROM LOWELL. 



247 



orchestra, as he does at more than one place in 

 "The Vision of Sir Launfal," — 



" The little birds sang as if it were 



The one day of summer in all the year, 

 And the very leaves seemed to sing on the trees." 



What bird lover has not often been caught in 

 such a mesh of bird song, on a bright day of the 

 early springtime? Even good-natured Hosea Big- 

 low cannot always repress his enthusiasm for the 

 birds, although he is quite too chary of his allusions 

 to them, — that is, too chary for the man who has 

 birds on the brain. His unsophisticated sincerity 

 cannot brook a perfunctory treatment of Nature's 

 blithe minstrels, for he breaks out scornfully in 

 denouncing those book-read poets who get "wut 

 they 've airly read " so " worked into their heart 

 an' head " that they 



"... can't seem to write but jest on sheers 

 With furrin countries or played-out ideers. 



This makes 'em talk o' daisies, larks, an' things, 

 Ez though we 'd nothin' here that blows an' sings. 

 Why, I 'd give more for one live bobolink 

 Than a square mile o' larks in printer's ink ! " 



Hosea, in spite of the meagreness of his allusions 

 to bird life, still proves beyond a doubt that he is 

 conversant with the migratory habits of the birds, 

 and that he has been watching a little impatiently 

 for their vernal appearance in his native fields and 

 woods, as every bird student who reads the following 

 lines will testify, — 



