THE MOCKING BIRD. 
305 
for I have always been an admirer of these elegant 
creatures, their notes, their nests, their eggs, and all 
the economy of their lives ; nor have we throughout 
the orders of creation any beings that so continually 
engage our attention as these our feathered companions. 
Winter takes from us all the gay world of the meads, 
the sylphs that hover over our flowers, that steal our 
sweets, that creep, or gently wing their way in glittering 
splendour around us ; and of all the miraculous creatures 
that sported their hour in the sunny beam, the winter 
gnat (tipula hiemolis ) alone remains to frolic in some 
rare and partial gleam. The myriads of the pool are 
dormant, or hidden from our sight ; the quadrupeds, 
few and wary, veil their actions in the glooms of 
night, and we see little of them ; but birds are with us 
always, they give a character to spring, and are identi- 
fied with it ; they enchant and amuse us all summer 
long with their sports, animation, hilarity, and glee ; 
they cluster round us, suppliant in the winter of our 
year, and, unrepining through cold and want, seek 
their scanty meal amidst the refuse of the barn, the 
stalls of the cattle, or at the doors of our house ; or, 
flitting hungry from one denuded and bare spray to 
another, excite our pity and regard. Their lives are 
patterns of gaiety, cleanliness, alacrity, and joy.” 
23 . TURDUS POLYGLOTTUS, LINNAEUS. THE MOCKING-BIRD. 
AUDUBON, PLATE XXII. 
Audubon says, “ It is where the great magnolia shoots 
up its majestic trunk, crowned with evergreen leaves, 
and decorated with a thousand beautiful flowers, that 
perfume the air around ; where the forests and fields 
are adorned with blossoms of every hue ; where the 
golden orange ornaments the gardens and groves ; 
where bignonias of various kinds interlace their climbing 
stems around the white-flowered stuartia, and mounting 
still higher, cover the summits of the lofty trees around, 
accompanied with innumerable vines, that here and 
there festoon the dense foliage of the magnificent woods, 
VOL. iv. u 
