Effie L. Hallett.
It might almost be said that the birds are all birds of the poets and of no one else, because it is only the poetical temperament that fully responds to them. So true is this, that all the great ornithologists—original namers and biographers of the birds—have been poets in deed if not in word. Audubon is a notable case in point, who, if he had not the tongue or pen of the poet, certainly had the eye and ear and heart and the singleness of purpose, the enthusiasm, the unworldliness, the love, that characterize the true and divine race of bards.
The very idea of a bird is a symbol and a suggestion to the poet. A bird seems to be at the top of the scale, so vehement and intense is his life—large-brained, large-lunged, hot, ecstatic, his frame charged with buoyancy and his heart with song. The beautiful vagabonds, endowed with every grace, masters of all chimes, and knowing no bounds—how many human aspirations are realized in their free, holiday lives, and how many suggestions to the poet in their flight and song!
John Burroughs
in "Birds and Poets."
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| RAINBOW TROUT. (Salmo irideus.) | COPYRIGHT 1900, BY A. W. MUMFORD, CHICAGO. | |
