Shall the dumb bird instructed say.”
And it is true that a wayside ramble will often do, by way of self-revelation and conviction, what no human voice of chastisement can accomplish. Mr. Howells says, in one of his most trenchant analytical novels: “If you’re not in first-rate spiritual condition, you’re apt to get floored if you undertake to commune with Nature.” There are times when the very immaculateness of the sky, or the purity of a woodland flower, rebukes one, gives one a keen sense of one’s sins, and makes one long for absolution; or when the pensive moaning of the wind through the gray, branchless trees on a winter’s day forces on the mind a prevision of a judgment about to be visited upon one’s misdoings. Yet this is seldom my own experience while idling in out-of-the-way places. Usually I feel soothed and comforted, or, at most, a sort of glad melancholy steals over me, which is as enchanting as a magician’s spell; while I often win exhilaration from the whispering breezes, as if they carried a tonic on their pulsing wings.
On the spring morning on which my friend so studiously avoided Nature’s by-paths, my stint of labor for the day was soon despatched, and then, flinging my lunch-bag over my shoulders, I hurried across the fields, anxious to put a comfortable distance between myself and bothering human tenements. By noon I had reached a green hollow at the border of a woodland, where Nature, to a large extent at least, has had her own sweet way. Here, on the grassy bank of a rivulet, I sat down to eat my luncheon. The spring near by filled my cup with ale that sparkles, but never burns; that quenches thirst, but never creates it. Not a human habitation was in sight; nothing but the tinkling brook, the sloping hills, the quiet woods, and the overarching sky. The haunt was not without music. The far-away cadences of the bush-sparrows on the hillside filled the place like melodious sunshine. A short distance down the hollow a song-sparrow thrummed his harp, while a cooing dove lent her dreamy threnody to the wayside trio. Although engaged in the prosaic act of eating my luncheon, I breathed in an atmosphere of poetry and romance, and half expected a company of water-witches and dryads to leap upon the greensward before me and dance to the music of bird and brook. A pagan I am not,—at least, such is my hope; but moods subjunctive sometimes seize me when I do not blame the Greeks—aye, rather, when I praise them—for peopling the woods with Pan and his retinue; for I feel the influence of a strange, mystical, and more than impersonal presence.
Yes, one’s dreams sometimes take on a speculative cast, even on a day that seems to be “the bridal of the earth and sky.” In this unfrequented spot the birds sing their sweetest carols, be there a human ear to hear or not. Do they sing merely for their own delectation, these little creatures of a day? Is there not far too much sweetness wasted on the desert air? Would there not be more purpose in Nature could these dulcet strains be treasured in some way, so that they might be poured into man’s appreciative ear? Why has Nature made no phonographs? Wherefore all this waste of ointment? Does Nature encourage the habits of the spendthrift? I recall a summer day when I strolled along a deep, lonely ravine. It was at least a mile to the nearest human dwelling. Suddenly a clear, melodious trill from a song-sparrow’s lusty throat rippled through the stillness, making my pulses flutter. Here, doubtless, the little Arion had sung his roundels all summer long, and perhaps I had been the only person who had heard him, and then I had caught only a few tantalizing strains—simply enough to give a taste for more. Why was the peerless triller apparently burying his talents in this solitary haunt?
It may be true of bird song, as of the recluse flower, that “beauty is its own excuse for being;” but I am not ashamed to record my confession of faith, my creed, on this matter; not my dreamy cogitations with ifs and mayhaps. There is a divine ear which catches every strain of wayside melody, and appreciates it at its true value. Thus, no beauty or sweetness is ever lost, no bird or flower is really an anchorite. A bird may flit away in alarm at the approach of a human intruder, and may not lisp a note until he is well out of the haunt; but the same songster will unconsciously pour his dithyrambs all summer long into the ear of God. Nature was not made for man alone; it was also made for its Creator. Never has the brown thrasher sung with such enchanting vigor and abandon as he did the other day at the corner of the woods when he thought no human auditor within ear-shot. He was singing for God, albeit unconsciously.
It is high time to get back to my waysiding, if I may coin a word. You must go to an out-of-the-way resort, far from the din of loom and factory, to feel the quaint, delicate fancy of Sidney Lanier’s lines,—
“Robins and mocking-birds that all day long
Athwart straight sunshine weave cross-threads of song,
Shuttles of music.”
The wayside rambler often is witness of delightful bird-pranks that must escape other eyes. On a bright day in February I strolled to the hollow to which I have already referred. The sun was melting the ice-mantle from the brook, and causing the snow to pour in runlets down the banks. In a broad, shallow curve of the stream the tree-sparrows and song-sparrows were taking a bath. I watched them for a long time. Some of them would remain in the ice-cold water for from three to five minutes, fluttering their wings and tails in perfect glee; and sending the pearl-drops and spray glimmering into the air. Their ablutions done, they would fly up to the saplings near by, and carefully preen and dry their moistened robes.