Birds and their nests

by Mary Howitt

CHAPTER IV.

THE BLACKBIRD.

The Blackbird is familiar to us all. It is a thoroughly English bird, and, with its cousin the thrush, is not only one of the pleasantest features in our English spring and summer landscape, but both figure in our old poetry and ballads, as the “merle and the mavis,” “the blackbird and the throstle-cock;” for those old poets loved the country, and could not speak of the greenwood without the bird.

When shaws are sheen and fields are fair,

And leaves both large and long,

’Tis merry walk’ng in the green forest

To hear the wild birds’ song;

The wood merle sings, and will not cease,

Sitting upon a spray;

The merle and the mavis shout their fill,