cowslip and the first-born spring flowers; scarcely has nature decked their nuptial couch with verdure,-before the sky is enlivened with the aërial legions. 12. The robin sings his own welcome to his native bowers. The boblink chatters in the meadows an air of inexpressible gladness and gaiety. The perwink and the thrasher draw out their canzonette* among the birchen thickets. The martin chatters under his accustomed window. The swallow skims the surface of the streams. 13. The night-hawk darts down the sky, proud of his feeble imitation of thunder, and the whip-poor-will again soothes the laborers to their evening rest. Every meadow, stream, and field, has its musician; and the fair girl, who watched the oriole in its hanging nest the preceding year, sees the same gilded traveller return to build again on the pensile branches of the whispering elm. 66 14. Poets have seen, in these migrating travellers of the air, only the desire to live in the bosom of eternal spring. They come to us," say they, "with the month of flowers, dwell in their peaceful groves while they are green, and disappear with their verdure." We have here attempted to point out the secret purpose of Nature, and the harmony and benevolence of her design. It is admirable to see her sending, with the unvarying regularity of the seasons, armies of birds feeding upon grain and insects, precisely at the epoch when the earth seems to implore their assistance. 15. The autumnal departure of these aërial voyagers has always been, to me, a period of not unpleasing melancholy. Many of them, in our climate, as the boblink, the oriole, the robin-red-breast, mount the air for departure, with a business note indeed, but not of song. There is a plaintive sadness in it. They sail over the bowers where they were born, where they have found their loves, and reared their young. 16. Their note seems to me the dirge of exile. In my ear it sounds as if questioning, whether, at the renewal of spring, they shall return to their natal bowers. Between their departure and the settled reign of winter, we have our flocks of plovers and ducks, of sand-hill cranes and pelicans, of geese, brants, and swans, that descend upon the western prairies. 17. They are joined by armies of ravens and vultures. They complete gathering the harvest of seeds and fruit, Canzonette, a short song. and cleansing away the last remains of decaying animals. Having finished their work, enveloped with fogs, they mount the wintry winds, and push their southern course, raising their sinister croakings, and winter resumes its reign of silence and sadness. Questions. What is meant by feathered family, in par. 1? cavities, inflated, in par. 2? menace, in 6th par.? emigrated? of vicissitudes, in par. 7? What time in the year do the equinoxes occur? the meaning of equinox? of aerial? the meaning of pensile, in par. 13? epoch, in par. 14? dirge, in par. 16? natal bowers? Who taught the birds at what time in autumn to migrate to a warmer elimate, and when to return, as spring approaches? Who directs them in their course? Does the youngest bird know as well before it has ever made the voyage, as after it has passed over the route many times? What is that called, which God has thus implanted within the animals, that leads them to provide for their safety and support? LESSON LXIII. The Birds in Autumn. 1. NOVEMBER came on with an eye severe, And all was cheerless, and bare, and gray. 2. Then the houseless grasshopper told his woes, And the humming-bird sent forth a wail for the rose; And the cricket his merry horn laid by, 3. Soon voices were heard at the morning prime, "Let us go! let us go!" said the bright-winged jay; I'll go if 'tis only the world to see." 4. "Will you go?" said the robin, "my only love?" 5. The oriole told, with a flashing eye, How his little one shrank from the frosty sky- 6. "I am ready to go," said the plump young wren, 7. Then up went the thrush, with a trumpet call ; And the martins came forth from their box on the wall, And the swallows convened on the old church tower; 8. "The dahlia is dead on her throne," said they ; 10. Then tribe after tribe, with its leader fair, Swept off through the fathomless depths of air. 11. Some spread o'er the waters a daring wing, Or amid the harem's haunts of fear, Their lodges to build, and their nurslings to rear. 12. The Indian fig, with its arching screen, Welcomes them into its vistas green; And the breathing buds of the spicy tree And the bulbul starts 'mid his carol clear, LESSON LXIV. 1. Now the summer days are past, Now the wintry time has come. 2. Short and gloomy are the days; Oft the storm roars round our dwelling: List the winds, of sorrow telling; See how sprightly it is burning! 4. Soon the spring of life will end; Fast our youthful days are flying! LESSON LXV. It Snows. 1. "IT snows!" cries the School-boy,-" Hurrah!" and his shout Is ringing through parlor and hall, While, swift as the wing of a swallow, he's out, Like the rapture that throbs in the pulse of the boy, Then lay not the trappings of gold on thine heirs, 2. "It snows!" sighs the Imbecile,-" Ah!" and his breath Comes heavy, as clogged with a weight; While, from the pale aspect of Nature in death, And nearer and nearer, his soft, cushioned chair Oh! small is the pleasure existence can give, 3. "It snows!" cries the Traveller,-" Ho!" and the word Has quickened his steed's lagging pace; The wind rushes by, but its howl is unheard— Unfelt the sharp drift in his face; For bright, through the tempest, his own home appeared- There's the clear, glowing hearth, and the table prepared, Blest thought! how it lightens the grief-laden hour, 4. "It snows!" cries the Belle,-" Dear, how lucky!" and turns From her mirror to watch the flakes fall; Like the first rose of summer, her dimpled cheek burns, There are visions of conquests, of splendor, and mirth, |