THE RETURN OF THE BIRDS 35 
The songsters of the seed-time are silent at the 
reaping of the harvest. Other minstrels take up 
the strain. It is the heyday of insect life. The 
day is canopied with musical sound. All the songs 
of the spring and summer appear to be floating, 
softened and refined, in the upper air. The birds, 
in a new but less holiday suit, turn their faces 
southward. The swallows flock and go; the bobo- 
links flock and go; silently and unobserved, the 
thrushes go. Autumn arrives, bringing’ finches, 
warblers, sparrows, and kinglets from the north, 
Silently the procession passes. Yonder hawk, sail- 
ing peacefully away till he is lost in the horizon, 
is a symbol of the closing season and the departing 
birds. 
1863. 
