FROM THE “COMPLETE ANGLER.”
At first the lark, when she means to rejoice, to cheer herself and those that hear her, she then quits the earth, and sings as she ascends higher into the air; and having ended her heavenly employment, grows then mute and sad, to think she must descend to the dull earth, which she would not touch but for necessity,
How do the blackbird and throssel, with their melodious voices, bid welcome to the cheerful spring, and in their fixed mouths warble forth such ditties as no art or instrument can reach to!
Nay, the smaller birds also do the like in their particular seasons, as, namely, the laverock, the titlark, the little linnet, and the honest robin, that loves mankind, both alive and dead.
But the nightingale—another of my airy creatures—breathes such sweet, loud music out of her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think miracles are not ceased. He that at midnight, when the very laborer sleeps securely, should hear—as I have very often—the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted above earth, and say, “Lord, what music hast thou provided for the saints in heaven, when thou afforded bad men such music on earth?”
Izaak Walton, 1593–1683.