And the wavering butterflies

O'er the spaces brown and bare

Light and wander here and there.

I shall stray by many a stream,

Where the half-shut lilies gleam.

Napping out the sultry days

In the quiet secluded bays;

Where the tasseled rushes tower,

O'er the purple pickerel-flower.

And the floating dragon-fly—

Azure glint and crystal gleam—

Watches o'er the burnished stream

With his eye of ebony;

Where the bull-frog lolls at rest

On his float of lily-leaves,

That the swaying water weaves,

And distends his yellow breast,

Lowing out from shore to shore

With a hollow vibrant roar;

Where the softest wind that blows

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