The Bird's Petition.

Mourn not for the owl nor his gloomy plight!

The owl hath his share of good:

If a prisoner he be in the broad daylight,
He is lord in the dark green wood!
Nor lonely the bird, nor his ghastly mate;
They are each unto each a pride-

Thrice fonder, perhaps, since a strange dark fate
Hath rent them from all beside!

So when the night falls, and dogs do howl,
Sing Ho! for the reign of the horned owl!

We know not alway who are kings by day,
But the king of the night is the bold brown owl.

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B. CORNWALL.

THE BIRD'S PETITION.

H, stay your hand, my little boy,

And do not rob my nest;

Why should you, for a moment's joy,

My happy brood molest?

My little ones, my hope and pride,

Have not yet learned to fly;
And if you take them from my side,

They soon will pine and die.

Think, gentle boy, what you would feel,
And your dear mother too,

If to your bed some thief should steal,
And hurry off with you?

Oh, do not, do not climb the tree,

To spoil our nest so warm,

For you indeed must cruel be

If you would do us harm.

Return then to your happy home,
And be it happy long;

And to your window I will come,

And thank you with a song.

S. W. PARTRIDGE.

DON'T KILL THE BIRDS.

ON'T kill the birds-the little birds

That sing about your door,

Soon as the joyous spring has come,

And chilling storms are o'er.

The little birds-how sweet they sing!
Oh, let them joyous live,

And do not seek to take their life,
Which you can never give.

Don't kill the birds-the pretty birds

That play among the trees;

'Twould make the earth a cheerless place

To see no more of these.

Don't kill the birds-the happy birds
That cheer the field and grove;
Such harmless things to look upon,
They claim our warmest love.

The Sparrow's Nest.

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THE THRUSH'S NEST.

ITHIN a thick and spreading hawthorn bush,

That overhung a mole-hill large and round, I heard from morn to morn a merry thrush Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound With joy; and oft, an unintruding guest,

I watched her secret toils from day to day,
How true she warped the moss to form her nest,
And modelled it within with wool and clay.
And by and by, like heath-bells gilt with dew,
There lay her shining eggs as bright as flowers,
Ink-spotted over, shells of green and blue;

And there I witnessed, in the summer hours,
A brood of nature's minstrels chirp and fly,
Glad as the sunshine and the laughing sky.
J. CLARKE.

THE SPARROW'S NEST.

EHOLD, within the leafy shade,

Those bright blue eggs together laid!

On me the chance-discovered sight

Gleamed like a vision of delight.—

I started-seeming to espy

The home and sheltered bed,

The sparrow's dwelling, which, hard by
My father's house, in wet or dry,
My sister Emmeline and I
Together visited.

She looked at it as if she feared it;

Still wishing, dreading to be near it :

Such heart was in her, being then
A little prattler among men.
The blessing of my later years

Was with me when a boy:

She gave me eyes, she gave me ears;
And humble cares, and delicate fears;
A heart, the fountain of sweet tears;
And love, and thought, and joy.

WORDSWORTH.

THE WREN'S NEST.

MONG the dwellings framed by birds
In field or forest with nice care,
Is none that with the little wren's

In snugness may compare.

No door the tenement requires,

And seldom needs a laboured roof;

Yet is it to the fiercest sun

Impervious, and storm-proof.

So warm, so beautiful withal,
In perfect fitness for its aim,
That to the Kind, by special grace,
Their instinct surely came.

And when for their abodes they seek

An opportune recess,

The hermit has no finer eye

For shadowy quietness.

The Wren's Nest.

These find, 'mid ivied abbey walls,
A canopy in some still nook;
Others are pent-housed by a brae
That overhangs a brook.

There to the brooding bird her mate
Warbles by fits his low clear song;
And by the busy streamlet both
Are sung to all day long.

Or in sequestered lanes they build,
Where, till the flitting bird's return,
Her eggs within the nest repose,

Like relics in an urn.

But still, where general choice is good,
There is a better and a best;
And, among fairest objects, some
Are fairer than the rest.

This, one of those small builders proved
In a green covert, where from out
The forehead of a pollard oak

The leafy antlers sprout;

For she who planned the mossy lodge,

Mistrusting her evasive skill,

IIad to a primrose looked for aid,

Her wishes to fulfil.

High on the trunk's projecting brow,
And fixed an infant's span above

The budding flowers, peeped forth the nest,
The prettiest of the grove !

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