This bird is also known as the Towee-finch, the Tshe-wink and Pee-wink, names derived from its favorite notes. It is found in great numbers in woods and overgrown meadows, and sometimes along the banks of streams, and is both familiar and playful. A pair will sometimes roam for a great distance along a water-course, scratching for insects, worms or seeds, and encouraging each other by their simple cry of tow-wee, tow-wee. They sometimes forage along gardens or pea-patches. On such occasions, they behold the approach of man with but little concern, and fly off only when in danger of being taken. The species is found in Canada, and probably farther north among the Rocky Mountains, and southward throughout the United States. They are, however, more abundant east of the Alleghanies than to the west. Sometimes, but not often, they pass the winter in Pennsylvania, but are constantly in the milder States during that season.
Their manner of building is rather peculiar; the nest being fixed on the ground, below the surface, and covered with leaves, or the shelter of an adjoining bush. It is rarely raised above the ground. The materials are fine bark, leaves, moss, dried grass and down. Sometimes part of the adjoining herbage is employed. The eggs are four or five in number, white, with a flesh color tint, and spotted with brown. In New England they raise but one brood, but in warm States two, the first in June, and the second during the following month. During this period they artfully draw the intruder from their charge, by pretending lameness, and feebly retreating as he pursues.
The Ground-Robin is about eight inches long, and eleven across the wings. The throat, neck, and whole upper part of the body is black, with feathers of the same color, interspersed with white, in the wings and tail. The belly is white, with bay thighs. In the female and young the black of the male is changed for olive brown, and there is less pure white in the tail and wings.
THE FORTIETH SONNET OF PETRARCA.
If honest love e’er merited reward,
If worship win the meed of yore it won,
I should be blest, since purer than the sun
The love my sighs and poesy record;
Yet ’tis not so: unwillingly are heard
My vows, and all regardlessly are flung
Her eyes o’er burning lines wherein is sung
Her matchless beauty, and my grief is bared.
But yet I hope that some day she may deign
To hearken to the tribute I have brought
And smile at least return for all my tears.
Still it may be I’ll languish here in vain
Until that dread catastrophe is wrought,
When time shall harvest all its sheaf of years.
CROSS PURPOSES.
———
BY KATE.
———
[SEE ENGRAVING.]
It is rather a dangerous experiment, this sporting with the feelings of a sweetheart, as many a loving swain has found; as Andy Bell and Harry Lee found, when they indulged in a walk home from church with Lilly James and Aggy Moore, to the neglect of two sweet sisters, Jane and Florence May.
Jane and Florence were the real sweethearts. Of the moonlight rambles they had enjoyed together; of the loving words whispered in the maidens’ ears; of the kisses beneath the shadows of old trees, stolen from half shrinking lips, we will say nothing. But such things had been. And even more. Mutual pledges of love had passed. Harry had vowed to Jane that, as she was the sweetest maiden in all the village, so she was to him the dearest; and Jane had drooped her eyes, and leaned closer to him, thus silently responding to the declaration of love; and when he took her hand, she let it linger in his warm clasp as if he had a right to its possession. And the same thing, slightly varied according to temperament, had happened with Andy and Florence. For months, the two young men were untiring in their attention to the sisters. Invariably, when the little congregation that worshiped in the village church on Sundays was dismissed, Andy and Harry were at the door, waiting for the expectant maidens, whom they as invariably attended home, lingering always by the way, to make the distance longer. And when the evening shadows fell in the winter, or the sun sunk low toward the western hills in the spring and summer time, at the waning of the Sabbath, the young men were sure to make their appearance at the quiet cottage home of the happy sisters.
Thus it had been for months, and all the village knew that they were sweethearts; and it was even said—how the intelligence was gained we know not—that, at the next Christmas, there would be a double wedding in Heathdale. Thus it was, when, one bright Sunday morning, as Andy Bell and Harry Lee were on their way to church, the former, who was in a gayer humor than usual, said, laughing as he spoke?—
“Suppose we plague the girls a little after meeting?”
“How?” asked Harry.
“If you’ll walk home with Aggy Moore, I’ll play the gallant to Lilly James.”
“Agreed,” was the thoughtless reply.
“And yet,” said Andy, “I wouldn’t give the little finger of Florence for Lilly’s whole body.”
“Nor would I give Jane’s little finger for a dozen Aggy Moores.”
Even at this early stage of the affair, both parties half repented; but neither felt like proposing to give up the little frolick agreed upon.
During the service the young lovers found their eyes meeting those of their sweethearts with accustomed frequency. But neither Andy nor Harry felt as comfortable as usual. Besides being about to deprive themselves of a long enjoyed pleasure, both felt misgivings as to the effect of their temporary desertion and disappointment of the expectant maidens.
At last the benediction was said, and the congregation began moving toward the door. Andy and Harry were out before the girls.
“Shall we do it?” asked the former.
“Oh, certainly,” replied Harry. And yet this was not said with the best grace in the world.
“There’s Aggy,” whispered Andy.
“I see,” returned Harry, moving forward, as Aggy stepped from the church-door. Just behind her was Jane, with her bright, dancing eyes, and lips just parting in a smile, as she caught sight of her lover. She moved forward more quickly, but stopped suddenly. Harry had spoken to Aggy, and was now walking away by her side. Just then Lilly James came forth, and Andy, crossing before Florence, who appeared at the same time, bowed to the maiden, and seeming not to see Florence, moved away from the church-door, smiling and chatting with a free and careless air. Neither of the young men looked behind to see the effect of all this upon the two young girls. But, to some extent, they imagined their feelings, and the picture fancy presented was not the most agreeable to contemplate.
It required an effort on the part of both Andy and Harry to continue to play the agreeable to the two young ladies they had substituted thus temporarily, and in sport, for their sweethearts, long enough to see them fairly home. They did not meet again until toward evening, and then each was on his way to seek the cottage-home of the one loved most dearly of any thing in the wide world.
“I wonder what they will say?” was uttered by Andy, in a doubting tone, as they moved along.
“Goodness knows! I’m afraid Jane took it hard,” remarked Harry. “I saw her countenance change as I turned to walk with Aggy.”
“It was a foolish prank, to make the best of it. But we must laugh it off with them.”
“I rather think we shall be paid back in our own coin,” said Harry. “Jane, I know, has a little spice about her.”
And Harry was not far wrong. When the two young men arrived at the cottage, and entered in their usual familiar way, the room where the maidens sat, they were received in a manner not in the least agreeable to their feelings. Both Jane and Florence had been deeply hurt by the conduct of their lovers; and both had indulged freely during the afternoon in the luxury of tears. The meaning of what had happened, they couldn’t tell. Had all this appearance of affection been a mere counterfeit? Were they the victims of a heartless coquetry? Or had Lilly and Aggy, through some strange influence, won the hearts of their lovers?
Great was the relief experienced by the troubled sisters when, on the waning of the Sabbath, they saw their truant swains approaching as usual. But, with this sense of relief, came a maidenly indignation, and a determination to resent the wanton slight that had been put upon them. Clouds were on the faces once so smiling and happy, when the young men entered, and their presence, so far from dispersing these clouds, only caused them to grow darker. It was in vain that every effort was made to remove them; not a sun-ray came to dispel their gloomy shadows. Explanations were made. The apparent slight was acknowledged as only a merry jest. However this relieved the oppressed hearts of the maidens, it did not lighten up their sober faces. Forgiveness and smiles were not to come so easily.
Andy affected to treat the whole matter lightly, and rather jested with Florence; but Harry’s sweetheart seemed so deeply grieved and wounded, that he had little to say after the first few efforts at reconciliation. Finally, the young men went away, apparently unforgiven; and all parties, for the next week, were unhappy enough. Sunday came again; and now the doubt in the minds of the young men was, whether, if they offered to go home as usual with Jane and Florence, they would be permitted by the offended maidens to do so. This doubt was, in a measure, dispelled during the morning service, for more than a dozen times did Andy catch a stealthy glance from Florence, in which was a beam of forgiveness; and the same thing happened to Harry as he turned his eyes frequently upon Jane. At last the service ended; and, as the young girls passed from the door, their lovers were beside them as usual. There was no repulse. The maidens were too glad to have them there once more. But, the feelings of each were sobered. Evening came, and they met as before. Their intercourse was tender but not joyous as it had been. And thus it was for weeks ere their hearts lost a sense of oppression. The reader may be sure that there were no more games at cross purposes after this. The lovers were cured of all inclination to indulge further in that species of pastime.
ON BURNING SOME OLD JOURNALS AND LETTERS.
———
BY THE LATE WALTER HERRIES, ESQ.
———
Ay, let them perish—why recall
Dreams of a by-gone day?
Why lift Oblivion’s funeral pall
Only to find decay?
The heart of youth lies buried there,
With all its hopes and fears,
Its burning joys, its wild despair,
Its agonies and tears.
A light has vanished from the earth,
A glory left the sky,
Since first within my soul had birth
Those visions pure and high;
Or is it that mine eye, grown dim,
Hath lost the power to trace
The glory of the Seraphim
Within life’s holy place?
Methinks I stand midway between
The future and the past,
The onward path is dimly seen,
Behind me clouds are cast;
Why should I seek to pierce that gloom
And call the buried host
Of haunting memories from the tomb?—
Each one a tortured ghost?
I could not look upon the page,
With eloquence o’erfraught,
Where, ere my head had grown so sage,
My heart its wild will wrought;
I could not—would not—ponder now
O’er my youth’s wayward madness,
Which left no stain on soul or brow,
Yet shrouded life in sadness.
Ay, let them perish!—from the dream
Of Passion’s wasted hour
There comes no retrospective gleam,
No spectre of the flower:
The treasured wealth of Eastern kings
Enriched their burial fire,
And thus my heart’s most precious things
Shall build its funeral pyre.
UNCLE TOM.
———
BY “SIMON.”
———
