68 
BIRDS 
since, while walking one Sunday in the 
edge of an orchard adjoining a wood, I 
heard one that so obviously and unmis¬ 
takably surpassed all his rivals, that my 
companion, though slow to notice such 
things, remarked it wonderingly; and 
with one accord we threw ourselves upon 
the grass and drank in the bounteous 
melody. It was not different in quality 
so much as in quantity. Such a flood 
of it! Such magnificent copiousness! 
Such long, trilling, deferring, accelerating 
preludes! Such sudden, ecstatic over¬ 
tures would have intoxicated the dullest 
ear. He was really without a compeer, 
a master artist. Twice afterward I was 
conscious of having heard the same bird. 
The Wood-Thrush is the handsomest spe¬ 
cies of this family. In grace and ele¬ 
gance of manner he has no equal. Such 
a gentle, high-bred air, and such inimit¬ 
able ease and composure in his flight and 
movement! He is a poet in very word 
and deed. His carriage is music to the 
eye. His performance of the commonest 
act, as catching a beetle or picking a 
worm from the mud, pleases like a stroke 
