Fancy the breaking of the sh.e.l.l, The chirp, the chickens wet and bare, The untried proud paternal swell; And you with housewife-matron air Enacting choicer bills of fare.

Fancy the embryo coats of down, The gradual feathers soft and sleek; Till clothed and strong from tail to crown, With virgin warblings in their beak, They too go forth to soar and seek.

So would it last an April through And early summer fresh with dew, Then should we part and live as twain: Love-time would bring me back to you And build our happy nest again.

CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.

_The Flight of the Birds_

Whither away, Robin, Whither away?

Is it through envy of the maple-leaf, Whose blushes mock the crimson of thy breast, Thou wilt not stay?

The summer days were long, yet all too brief The happy season thou hast been our guest: Whither away?

Whither away, Bluebird, Whither away?

The blast is chill, yet in the upper sky Thou still canst find the color of thy wing, The hue of May.

Warbler, why speed thy southern flight? ah, why, Thou too, whose song first told us of the Spring?

Whither away?

Whither away, Swallow, Whither away?

Canst thou no longer tarry in the North, Here, where our roof so well hath screened thy nest?

Not one short day?

Wilt thou--as if thou human wert--go forth And wanton far from them who love thee best?

Whither away?

EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN.

_The Shepherd's Home_

My banks they are furnished with bees, Whose murmur invites one to sleep; My grottoes are shaded with trees, And my hills are white over with sheep.

I seldom have met with a loss, Such health do my fountains bestow; My fountains all bordered with moss, Where the harebells and violets blow.

Not a pine in the grove is there seen, But with tendrils of woodbine is bound; Not a beech's more beautiful green, But a sweetbrier entwines it around.

Not my fields in the prime of the year, More charms than my cattle unfold; Not a brook that is limpid and clear, But it glitters with fishes of gold.

I have found out a gift for my fair, I have found where the wood pigeons breed, But let me such plunder forbear, She will say 'twas a barbarous deed; For he ne'er could be true, she averred, Who would rob a poor bird of its young; And I loved her the more when I heard Such tenderness fall from her tongue.

WILLIAM SHENSTONE.

_To a Cricket_

Voice of Summer, keen and shrill, Chirping round my winter fire, Of thy song I never tire, Weary others as they will; For thy song with Summer's filled-- Filled with sunshine, filled with June; Firelight echo of that noon Heard in fields when all is stilled In the golden light of May, Bringing scents of new-mown hay, Bees, and birds, and flowers away: Prithee, haunt my fireside still, Voice of Summer, keen and shrill!

WILLIAM C. BENNETT.

_On the Gra.s.shopper and Cricket_

The poetry of earth is never dead: When all the birds are faint with the hot sun, And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead; That is the Gra.s.shopper's--he takes the lead In summer luxury,--he has never done With his delights; for when tired out with fun, He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.

The poetry of earth is ceasing never: On a lone winter evening, when the frost Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever, And seems to one, in drowsiness half lost, The Gra.s.shopper's among some gra.s.sy hills.

JOHN KEATS.

_The Tax-Gatherer_

"And pray, who are you?"

Said the violet blue To the Bee, with surprise At his wonderful size, In her eye-gla.s.s of dew.

"I, madam," quoth he, "Am a publican Bee, Collecting the tax Of honey and wax.

Have you nothing for me?"

JOHN B. TABB.

_To the Gra.s.shopper and the Cricket_

Green little vaulter in the sunny gra.s.s, Catching your heart up at the feel of June,-- Sole voice that's heard amidst the lazy noon, When even the bees lag at the summoning bra.s.s; And you, warm little housekeeper, who cla.s.s With those who think the candles come too soon, Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune Nick the glad silent moments as they pa.s.s!

O sweet and tiny cousins, that belong, One to the fields, the other to the hearth, Both have your sunshine; both, though small, are strong At your clear hearts; and both seem given to earth To sing in thoughtful ears their natural song,-- In doors and out, summer and winter, Mirth.

LEIGH HUNT.

_The Bee_

Like trains of cars on tracks of plush I hear the level bee: A jar across the flowers goes, Their velvet masonry

Withstands until the sweet a.s.sault Their chivalry consumes, While he, victorious, tilts away To vanquish other blooms.

His feet are shod with gauze, His helmet is of gold; His breast, a single onyx With chrysoprase, inlaid.

His labor is a chant, His idleness a tune; Oh, for a bee's experience Of clovers and of noon!

EMILY d.i.c.kINSON.

_The Humble-Bee_

Burly, dozing humble-bee, Where thou art is clime for me.

Let them sail for Porto Rique, Far-off heats through seas to seek; I will follow thee alone, Thou animated torrid zone!

Zigzag steerer, desert cheerer, Let me chase thy waving lines; Keep me nearer, me thy hearer, Singing over shrubs and vines.

Insect lover of the sun, Joy of thy dominion!

Sailor of the atmosphere; Swimmer through the waves of air; Voyager of light and noon; Epicurean of June,-- Wait, I prithee, till I come Within earshot of thy hum,-- All without is martyrdom.

When the south wind, in May days, With a net of shining haze Silvers the horizon wall, And with softness touching all, Tints the human countenance With a color of romance, And, infusing subtle heats, Turns the sod to violets, Thou, in sunny solitudes, Rover of the underwoods, The green silence dost displace With thy mellow, breezy ba.s.s.