34 INSESSOEES. 



song, and taste, and sensibility, and refinement. While 

 this lasted he was sacred from injury; the very school- 

 boy would not fling a stone at him, and the merest 

 rustic would pause to listen to his strain. But mark 

 the difference. As the year advances, as the clover 

 blossoms disappear, and the spring fades into sum- 

 mer, he gradually gives up his elegant tastes and 

 habits, doffs his poetical suit of black, assumes a rus- 

 set, dusky s;arb, and sinks to the gross enjoyment of 

 common vulgar birds. His notes no longer vibrate 

 on the ear ; he is stuffing himself with the seeds of 

 the tall weeds, on which he lately swung and chaunted 

 so melodiously. He has become a ' bon vivant,' a 

 ' gourmand ;' with him now there is nothing like the 

 'joys of the table.' In a little while he grows tired 

 of plain, homely fare, and is off on a gastronomical 

 tour in quest of foreign luxuries. We next hear of 

 him, with myriads of his kind, banqueting among 

 the reeds of the Delaware, and grown corpulent with 

 good feeding. He has changed his name in travel- 

 ing; Boblincon no more, he is the Reed-hird now, 

 the much-sought-for titbit of Pennsylvania epicures, 

 the rival in unlucky fame of the ortolan ! Wherever 

 he goes, pop ! pop ! pop ! every rusty firelock in the 

 country is blazing away. He sees his companions 

 falling by thousands around him. 



" Does he take warning and reform ? Alas, not 

 he ! Incorrigible epicure ! again he wings his flight. 

 The rice-swamps of the South invite him. He gorges 

 himself among them almost to bursting; he can scarcely 

 fly for corpulency. He has once more changed his 



