222 TYRANT FLYCATCHER, OR KING BIRD. 



Its plains immense, wide opening on the day, 

 Its lakes and isles, where feathered millions play : 

 All tempt not him ; till, gazing from on high, 

 Columbia's regions wide below him lie ; 

 There end his wanderings and his wish to roam, 

 There lie his native woods, his fields, his home ; 

 Down, circling, he descends, from azure heights, 

 And on a full-blown sassafras alights. 



Fatigued and silent, for a while he views 

 His old frequented haunts and shades recluse, 

 Sees brothers, comrades, every hour arrive — 

 Hears, humming round, the tenants of the hive : 

 Love fires his breast ; he woos, and soon is blest ; 

 And in the blooming orchard builds his nest. 



Come now, ye cowards ! ye whom Heaven disdains, 

 Who boast the happiest home — the richest plains ; 

 On whom, perchance, a wife, an infant's eye, 

 Hang as their hope, and on your arm rely ; 

 Yet, when the hour of danger and dismay 

 Comes on your country, sneak in holes away, 

 Shrink from the perils ye were bound to face, 

 And leave those babes and country to disgrace; 

 Come here (if such we have), ye dastard herd ! 

 And kneel in dust before this noble bird. 



When the specked eggs within his nest appear, 

 Then glows affection, ardent and sincere ; 

 No discord sours him when his mate he meets ; 

 But each warm heart with mutual kindness beats. 

 For her repast he bears along the lea 

 The bloated gadfly, and the balmy bee ; 

 For her repose scours o'er the adjacent farm, 

 Whence hawks might dart, or lurking foes alarm ; 

 For now abroad a band of ruffians prey, 

 The crow, the cuckoo, and the insidious jay ; 

 These, in the owner's absence, all destroy, 

 And murder every hope and every joy. 



Soft sits his brooding mate, her guardian he, 

 Perched on the top of some tall neighbouring tree ; 

 Thence, from the thicket to the concave skies, 

 His watchful eye around unceasing flies. 

 Wrens, thrushes, warblers, startled at hi8 note, 

 Fly in affright the consecrated spot. 

 He drives the plundering jay, with honest scorn, 

 Back to his woods ; the mocker, to his thorn ; 

 Sweeps round the cucTcoo, as the thief retreats; 

 Attacks the crow; the diving hawk defeats ; 

 Darts on the eagle downwards from afar, 

 And, 'midst the clouds, prolongs the whirling war. 



