Where the burnished cup of the marigold gleams;

Skirting the reeds, where the quick winds shiver

On the swelling breast of the dimpled river,

And the blue of the king-fisher hangs and poises,

Watching a spot by the edge of the streams;

By the miles of the fences warped and dyed

With the white-hot noons and their withering fires,

Where the rough bees trample the creamy bosoms

Of the hanging tufts of the elder blossoms,

And the spiders weave, and the grey snakes hide,

In the crannied gloom of the stones and the briers;

Over the meadow lands sprouting with thistle,

Where the humming wings of the blackbirds pass,

[Pg 20]

Where the hollows are banked with the violets flowering,

And the long-limbed pendulous elms are towering,

Where the robins are loud with their voluble whistle,

And the ground sparrow scurries away through the grass,

Where the restless bobolink loiters and woos

Down in the hollows and over the swells,

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