38 
BIRDS IN A VILLAGE. 
it grew more and more laugh-like — a long, far- 
reaching, ringing laugh ; not the langh I should 
like to hear from any person I take an interest in, 
but a laugh with all the gladness, unction, and 
humanity gone out of it — a dry, mechanical sound, 
as if a soulless, lifeless, wind instrument had 
laughed. It was very curious. Listening to it day 
by day, something of the strange history of the 
being, once but no longer human, that uttered it 
grew up and took shape in my mind ; for we all 
have in us something of this mysterious faculty. 
It was no bird, no wryneck, but a being that once, 
long, long ago, in that same beautiful place, had 
been a village boy — a free, careless, glad-hearted 
boy, like many another. But to this boy life was 
more than to others, since nature appeared im- 
measurably more vivid on account of his brighter 
senses ; therefore his love of life and happiness in 
life greatly surpassed theirs. Annually the trees 
shed their leaves, the flowers perished, the birds 
flew away to some distant country beyond the 
horizon, and the sun grew pale and cold in the 
sky ; but the bright impression all things made on 
hira gave him a joy that was perennial. The 
briony, woodbine, and honeysuckle he had looked 
on withered in the hedges, but their presentments 
flourished untouched by frost, as if his warmth 
sustained and gave them perpetual life ; in that 
