A Pleasant Seat. 



123 



business on hand, which indeed he has, and that is to 

 keep himself alive — the only one we have seen on our 

 morning journey — with his exquisitely coloured neck 

 and throat and velvety back. They are not tolerated 

 in our region, having such a bad repute for eating 

 fruit-buds, and in the early spring it moved me to see 

 little strings of them brought in by the young farmers 

 just to show what execution they had done, as I could 



not help thinking of the floods of music prematurely 

 silenced — but that was not likely to weigh much with 

 them. 



Here we are at a little fence on which I often sit as 

 I pass, just to watch the effect of the first kindling rays 

 of the sun on a bit of water. What a fair world is 

 mirrored there the moment the sun looks in ! The 

 little stagnant deep mirrors wondrous heaven with 

 softer sky, clouds already edged with fire, and fleecy 



