Chapter II

And now, if the night shall be cold, across the sky
Linnets and twites, in small flocks helter-skelter,
All the afternoon to the gardens fly,
From thistle-pastures hurrying to gain the shelter
Of American rhododendron or cherry-laurel;
And here and there, near chilly setting of sun,
In an isolated tree a congregation
Of starlings chatter and chide,
Thickset as summer leaves, in garrulous quarrel.
Suddenly they hush as one,--
The tree-top springs,--
And off, with a whirr of wings,
They fly by the score
To the holly-thicket, and there with myriads more
Dispute for the roosts; and from the unseen nation
A babel of tongues, like running water unceasing,
Makes live the wood, the flocking cries increasing,
Wrangling discordantly, incessantly,
While falls the night on them self-occupied,--
The long, dark night, that lengthens slow,
Deepening with winter to starve grass and tree,
And soon to bury in snow
The earth, that, sleeping ’neath her frozen stole,
Shall dream a dream crept from the sunless pole
Of how her end shall be.

THE SOUTH WIND.