FISHING

YOU ask me, why I love this fishing,

You

Why, by some quiet stream I care to stray,

When far from out the south a-blowing,

The wind comes gently at the break of day.

You ask me, why I love to harken

As o'er the mossy stones, the waters sing. Why, often there, I stop and ponder

The message that those laughing waters bring.

I answer: Have you tried this fishing,

When 'round your soul life's weary burdens lie? Have you gone forth and heard the waters

That sing of peace, beneath God's open sky?

Of peace and rest, rest for one weary.

Of strength to throw aside some long-borne care.

That joy one finds a-fishing,

Such have I found beside the waters there.

APRIL'S DAY

IN THE tall elm tree sat the robin bright,

I

Through the rainy April day,

And he carolled clear with a pure delight

In the face of the sky so gray,

And the silver rain through the blossoms dropped, And fell on the robin's coat.

And his brave red breast, but he never stopped Singing his cheerful note.

For, oh, the fields were green and glad,
And the blissful life that stirred

In the earth's wide breast was full and warm
In the heart of the little bird.

The rain-cloud lifted, the sunset light

Streamed wide over valley and hill

As the plains of heaven the land grew bright
And the warm south wind was still.

Then loud and clear called the happy bird,
And rapturously he sang.

Till wood and meadow and riverside

With jubilant echoes rang.

But the sun dropped down in the great west,

And he hushed his song at last,

All nature softly sang to rest.

And the April day had passed.

-Celia Thaxter.

DICKCISSEL

T

HE male of this species is beautifully blended with yellow, white and gray, and has a black throat patch and brown shoulders. The female is duller. In the middle portions of the United States these birds, or Black-throated Buntings, as they are commonly called, are very numerous, frequenting dry, bushy fields or prairies. They are very persistent songsters, although their song is weak and has little melody. In July and August, when many birds are silent, they continue their plaintive chant even on the most sultry days.

The song is a simple chanting, "chip, chip, che-che-che." The nest is made either on the ground, in bushes or thistles or in trees, being constructed of weeds, grasses, rootlets, corn husks, etc. There are four or five eggs in number, which are plain bluish white and hardly distinguishable from those of the Bluebird.

The Dickcissel breed in North America east of the Rockies, from the Gulf States north to the northern part of the United States; they are rare in the Atlantic States north to Connecticut.

-Bird Guide.

THE BIRDS

TIS

IS spring and the birds are here again,
Who blithely carol forth their lay;

Each morn they swell their warbling throats
To greet the new, the budding day.

The robin on a topmost spray,

With breast of red and coat of brown,

Sings gaily at the dawn of day,

A song no care can drown.

The bluebird flitting here and there,
With flash of color and burst of song,
Sings of a mossy nest so rare,

On which the sun shines all day long.

The meadow lark, with song so sweet, Soars toward the vaulted sky and sings A lay that thrills with joyousness

And to our hearts great pleasure brings.

With carol sweet as silver chimes,
O birds, ye heralds of the spring,
What harmony to us you bring,
And gladness in our darkest times.
-Herbert Wilson.