DOWN FERRY LANE. 



41 



"Every one's a funny fellow; every one's a little mellow; 

 Follow, follow, follow, follow, o'er the hill and in the 

 hollow! 



Merrily, merrily, there they hie; now they rise and now 

 they fly; 



* * * * * * 



Happy's the wooing that's speedily doing, that's speedily 

 doing, 



That's merry and over with the bloom of the clover! 

 Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winterseeble, follow, follow me!" 



These are the butterfly days of the bobolink, for he 

 undergoes almost as much a metamorphosis as does 

 the caterpillar in the chrysalis. Our jaunty friend 

 arrives on our meadows about the second week in May, 

 but he is entirely dumb by the Fourth of July. His 

 little family are usually on their feet when haying 

 begins, his striking wedding garments are exchanged 

 for a dull, mixed brown traveling suit, made out of 

 the same piece as his wife's, and by the middle of 

 August he is on his way South, a changed being, 

 there to become the reed bird of Virginia and the 

 rice bird of the Carolinas. Let us be thankful that 

 he spends his honeymoon with us, and so long as we 

 have his music, other people can keep the game. 



Long before the bobolink comes and months after 

 he is gone, we have the meadowlark. Do you hear 



