Song Birds and Water Fowl 



ciation with that glorious element from whi 

 they seem to derive their birth, and a porti 

 of whose spirit they appear to fling upon 1 

 winds. In such an atmosphere one cannot f 

 their lack of melody. Indeed, it would s© 

 incongruous if sea fowl had been gifted w 

 the power of song. The mood that anima 

 the oriole and bobolink would ill befit 1 

 solemn, lonely grandeur of the ocean's restl 

 life, whose stormy billows are so furious a 

 defiant, while even his gentlest waves seem t 

 ribly in earnest, with the quiet grandeur 

 suppressed omnipotence. The human hea 

 when sensible of his majestic pulse, will stroi 

 ly throb in unison, but throb in silence, 1 

 songs of earth are trivial and ephemeral agai: 

 the ocean's massive and eternal undertones ; ( 

 contrast grates upon the ear. And when, 

 storm, he dashes his stupendous, thunderi 

 waves against the shore, the spell-bound audi 

 may well exclaim, " Before the ocean's aug 

 presence, let all the earth keep silence ! ' ' 



And yet the aqueous element — so it he/r, 

 water — is a very harmonious factor in tl 

 ensemi/e of Nature wherein the melody is giv 

 to the birds. The delicious warble of the wr( 

 the vireo, the water thrush, may effectiv( 



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