And from the thyme upon the height
And from the elder-blossom white
And pale dog-roses in the hedge,
And from the mint-plant in the sedge,
In puffs of balm the night-air blows
The perfume which the day foregoes.
I would call it poetry, if it were poetry. And it is poetry, yet it is a great deal more. It is poetry and owls and sour apples and toads; for in this particular old apple dwells also a tree-toad.
It is curious enough, as the summer dusk comes on, to see the round face of the owl in one hole, and out of another in the broken limb above, the flat weazened face of the tree-toad. Philosophic countenances they are, masked with wisdom, both of them: shrewd and penetrating that of the slit-eyed owl; contemplative and soaring in its serene composure the countenance of the transcendental toad. Both creatures love the dusk; both have come forth to their open doors in order to watch the darkening; both will make off under the cover—one for mice and frogs over the meadow, the other for slugs and insects over the crooked, tangled limbs of the tree.
It is strange enough to see them together, but it is stranger still to think of them together, for it is just such prey as this little toad that the owl has gone over the meadow to catch.
Why does he not take the supper ready here on the shelf? There may be reasons that we, who do not eat tree-toad, know nothing of; but I am inclined to believe that the owl has never seen his fellow lodger in the doorway above, though he must often have heard him piping his gentle melancholy in the gloaming, when his skin cries for rain!