And we watch the black beetle on rolling his ball;
Then forward again, with new strength, on our way,
Our footsteps as light as our bosoms are gay,
A whirr—and, so sudden, the heart gives a bound,
The partridge bursts up from his basin of ground;
Three clear, fife-like notes—first, a low, liquid strain,
Then high, and then shrill—all repeated again,
’Tis the brown-thresher, perch’d on yon pine grim and dark,
Our sweetest of minstrels—our own native lark.
We pass the low sawmill—the bridge o’er the brook,