He has been sipping honey from your passion-flowers, and now has come to taste my blossoms. What bright-winged thought of yours sent him so straight to me, across that wide space of sea and land? Did he dart like a sunbeam all the way? There were many of them voyaged together; a little line of wavering light pierced the dark that night.
A large, brave heart has our bold sailor of the upper deep. Old Pindar never saw our little pet, this darling of the New World; yet he says,—
"Were it the will of Heaven, an osier-bough Were vessel safe enough the seas to plough."
Here he is, safe enough, not one tiny feather ruffled,—all the intense life of the tropics condensed into this one live jewel,—the glance of the sun on emeralds and rubies. Is it soft downy feathers that take this rich metallic glow, changing their hue with every rapid turn?
Other birds fly: he darts quick as the glance of the eye,—sudden as thought, he is here, he is there. No floating, balancing motion, like the lazy butterfly, who fans the air with her broad sails. To the point, always to the point, he turns in straight lines. How stumbling and heavy is the flight of the "burly, dozing bumblebee," beside this quick intelligence! Our knight of the ruby throat, with lance in rest, makes wild and rapid sallies on this "little mundane bird,"—this bumblebee,—this rolling sailor, never off his sea-legs, always spinning his long homespun yarns. This rich bed of golden and crimson flowers is a handsome field of tournament. What invisible circle sits round to adjudge the prize?
What secret does he bring me under those misty wings,—that busy birring sound, like Neighbor Clark's spinning-wheel? Is he busy as well, this bit of pure light and heat? Yes! he, too, has got a little home down in the swamp over there,—that bit of a knot on the young oak-sapling. Last year we found a nest (and brought it home) lined with the floss of willow-catkin, stuck all over with lichens, deep enough to secure the two pure round pearls from being thrown out, strongly fastened to the forked branch,—a home so snug, so warm, so soft!—a home "contrived for fairy needs."
Who but the fairies, or Mr. Fine-Ear himself, ever heard the tiny tap of the young bird, when he breaks the imprisoning shell?
The mother-bird knows well the fine sound. Hours? days? no, weeks, she has sat to hear at last that least wave of sound.
What! this tiny bit of restless motion sit there still? Minutes must be long hours to her quick panting heart.
I will just whisper it in your ear, that the meek-looking mother-bird only comes out between daylight and dark,—just like other busy mothers I have known, who take a little run out after tea.