Article October 7, 1905 Issue

The Song of a Bird

BERTHA JENNINGS AMES.

Early one morning, as I was passing through the garden, the shrill, sweet notes of a brown thrush attracted my attention, as he sang in the walnut tree. Some sparrows, seemingly envious of the beautiful song, were fluttering about, and trying to drive him away. With scarce a missing note he flew to the top of the tree, and there, uninterrupted, he finished his song. Morning after morning he came to the tree, always singing from the highest branch, to which the little sparrows had driven him. Though the redbird sang from the cedar and the wren from her house in the tree, the robin and many other birds blending their sweet voices in this early morning chorus, it only seemed to inspire the thrush to give forth more freely his beautiful song.

Here I learned a lesson. Though difficulties and annoyances may surround us, this should only serve to lift our thoughts higher, and thus we would lose sight of these annoying, petty trifles. Like the thrush, having once attained a high position, we should never be content with a lower one.

The thrush ceased not his singing because the sparrows harassed him, nor because the robin's or the redbird's coats were a more beautiful color than his own, nor did he attempt to imitate their songs.

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