"What! Simple customs and innocence not to be found in the country, nor among birds? My dear friend, what do you tell me?"
"The pure truth and nothing more. Just figure to yourself that on our arrival here, whom should we meet but those chattering linnets, who went off in search of cold and storm when the spring came with long days and bright flowers! We tried to dissuade the crazy creatures, but they answered us with the utmost insolence."
"What did they say?"
"They said to us—
'Whither do we go?
Whence come you, gossips,
Who travel so little
And talk so much?'
This was their reply to us, and on hearing it, we made them march to double-quick time."
"What do I hear!" exclaimed the interlocutor. "That any one has dared to accuse us, the most truthful and discreet of birds, of being gossips?"
"Then what will you think when I tell you," said the first speaker, "that the lark, who was so timid and ladylike, has become an insolent pilferer, and that—
The lady lark upon her flight
Pilfers pulse and pilfers maize
Before the very sower's sight,
And at his anger pertly says,
'Sower, sower, more seed sow,
As that sown can never grow'?"
"I am astounded!"