In White of Selborne’s loving view,—
He told how teal and loon he shot,
 | And how the eagle’s eggs he got, The feats on pond and river done, The prodigies of rod and gun; Till, warming with the tales he told, Forgotten was the outside cold, The bitter wind unheeded blew, From ripening corn the pigeons flew, |
 | |
The partridge drummed i’ the wood, the mink Went fishing down the river-brink; In fields with bean or clover gay, The woodchuck, like a hermit gray, Peered from the doorway of his cell; The muskrat plied the mason’s trade, And tier by tier his mud-walls laid; |  |
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And from the shagbark overhead
The grizzled squirrel dropped his shell.
Next, the dear aunt, whose smile of cheer
And voice in dreams I see and hear,—
The sweetest woman ever Fate
Perverse denied a household mate,