Part 21

“A week ago the sparrow was divine; The bluebird, shifting his light load of song From post to post along the cheerless fence, Was as a rhymer ere the poet come; But now, oh, rapture! sunshine winged and voiced, Pipe blown through by the warm, wild breath of the West, Shepherding his soft droves of fleecy cloud, Gladness of woods, skies, waters, all in one, The bobolink has come, and, like the soul Of the sweet season, vocal in a bird, Gurgles in ecstasy we know not what, Save June! Dear June! Now God be praised for June.”

The only fault to be found with this exquisite tribute is that it is rather too much involved to glide melodiously from the lips, or be quite clear to the mind until after a second or third reading. Not so picturesque, but more simple and musical, is this bit,—

“From blossom-clouded orchards, far away The bobolink tinkled.”

The provincial tongue of Hosea Biglow presents us with the following rare bit of portraiture, which has all the strength and freshness of a painting from Nature:—

“June’s bridesman, poet o’ the year, Gladness on wings, the bobolink is here; Half-hid in tip-top apple-bloom he sings, Or climbs against the breeze with quiverin’ wings, Or, givin’ way to’t in mock despair, Runs down, a brook o’ laughter, thro’ the air,”—

a rhythmical tribute that is both an honor to the poet and a compliment to the bobolink.

The Baltimore oriole also claims Mr. Lowell’s admiration. There is one descriptive passage relative to this bird that, in my opinion, goes ahead of even the famous bobolink eulogy just quoted:

“Hush! ’Tis he! My oriole, my glance of summer fire, Is come at last, and, ever on the watch, Twitches the pack-thread I had lightly wound About the bough to help his housekeeping,— Twitches and scouts by turns, blessing his luck, Yet fearing me who laid it in his way, Nor, more than wiser we in our affairs, Divines the providence that hides and helps. Heave, ho! Heave, ho! he whistles as the twine Slackens its hold; once more, now! and a flash Lightens across the sunlight to the elm Where his mate dangles at her cup of felt Nor all his booty is the thread; he trails My loosened thought with it along the air, And I must follow, would I ever find The inward rhyme to all this wealth of life.”

The last sentence is a deft turn at weaving, oriole-like, a thread of moral reflection into a fine piece of description. Even in his later years Lowell could not throw off the spell that this summer flake of gold had thrown over him; for in his volume called “Heartsease and Rue” he has inserted a little poem entitled “The Nest” that for rhythmical flow and beauty has not been excelled by any of his earlier productions. He first describes the nest in May as follows:—

“Then from the honeysuckle gray The oriole with experienced quest Twitches the fibrous bark away, The cordage of his hammock nest, Cheering his labor with a note Rich as the orange of his throat.

“High o’er the loud and dusty road The soft gray cup in safety swings, To brim ere August with its load Of downy breasts and throbbing wings, O’er which the friendly elm-tree heaves An emerald roof with sculptured leaves. · · · · · · · Thy duty, wingëd flame of Spring, Is but to love and fly and sing.”

Then he chants a pathetic “palinode,” as he calls it, in December, when

“... homeless winds complain along The columned choir once thrilled with song.

“And thou, dear nest, whence joy and praise The thankful oriole used to pour, Swing’st empty while the north winds chase Their snowy swarms from Labrador. But, loyal to the happy past, I love thee still for what thou wast.”

Besides the bobolink and the oriole, the blackbird is often made to do charming duty in Lowell’s verse. Every student of the birds has often seen the picture described by the line,—

“Alders the creaking red-wings sink on;”

or heard

“... the blackbirds clatt’rin’ in tall trees An’ settlin’ things in windy Congresses,— Queer politicians, though, for I’ll be skinned Ef all on ’em don’t head against the wind.”

A number of quotations in which the robin figures conspicuously have already been given. One more occurs to me,—that in which Hosea Biglow exclaims,—

“Thet’s robin-redbreast’s almanick; he knows That arter this ther’ ’s only blossom-snows; So, choosin’ out a handy crotch an’ spouse, He goes to plast’rin’ his adobë house.”

But hold! here is still another:—

“The Maple puts her corals on in May, While loitering frosts about the lowlands cling, To be in tune with what the robins sing, Plastering new log-huts ’mid her branches gray.”

It can scarcely be hoped to make this anthology from Lowell exhaustive, for almost every time I turn the leaves of his poetical works I stumble upon some reference to the birds before unnoted; but this article would be incomplete should one of his choicest bits of metrical description, which must bring both anthology and book to a close, be omitted. It is found in the poem entitled “The Nightingale in the Study,” the whole of which must be read to catch the drift of its moral teaching. The poet doubtless attributes more magnanimity to the cat-bird than that carolist is entitled to,—but no matter; the Muses cannot be over-precise. Here is a charmer:—

“‘Come forth!’ my cat-bird calls to me, ‘And hear me sing a cavatina That, in this old familiar tree, Shall hang a garden of Alcina.

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“‘Or, if to me you will not hark, By Beaver Brook a thrush is ringing Till all the alder-coverts dark Seem sunshine-dappled with his singing.

“‘Come out beneath the unmastered sky, With its emancipating spaces, And learn to sing as well as I, Without premeditated graces.

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