Away, thou soul,
(let me pick thee out singly, reader dear, and talk in perfect
freedom, negligently, confidentially,) for one day and night at least,
returning to the naked source-life of us all--to the breast of the
great silent savage all-acceptive Mother. Alas! how many of us are
so sodden--how many have wander'd so far away, that return is almost
impossible.
But to my jottings, taking them as they come, from the heap, without
particular selection. There is little consecutiveness in dates. They
run any time within nearly five or six years. Each was carelessly
pencilled in the open air, at the time and place. The printers will
learn this to some vexation perhaps, as much of their copy is from
those hastily-written first notes.
BIRDS MIGRATING AT MIDNIGHT
Did you ever chance to hear the midnight flight of birds passing
through the air and darkness overhead, in countless armies, changing
their early or late summer habitat? It is something not to be
forgotten. A friend called me up just after 12 last night to mark the
peculiar noise of unusually immense flocks migrating north (rather
late this year.) In the silence, shadow and delicious odor of the
hour, (the natural perfume belonging to the night alone,) I thought it
rare music. You could _hear_ the characteristic motion--once or twice
"the rush of mighty wings," but often a velvety rustle, long drawn
out--sometimes quite near--with continual calls and chirps, and some
song-notes. It all lasted from 12 till after 3.
Pages:
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150