“Son,” she said, “thou lay’st thy snares each morning,
And each day thou comest back empty handed!
Either thou lack’st skill, or thou art idle;
Others can take prey where thou’st taken none!”
Thus to her the gay young man made answer:
“Who need wonder that our luck is different,
When the same birds are not for our snaring?
At the little farm that lieth yonder,
Lives a wondrous bird, my good old mother;
Snares I laid to catch it all the autumn,