I am not sure how long I could have stayed in such a spot, if I had not
been able to look now and then through the branches of the under-woods
out upon the sunny lake. Swallows innumerable were playing over the
water, many of them soaring so high as to be all but invisible. Wise and
happy birds, lovers of sunlight and air. _They_ would never be found in
a cypress swamp. Along the shore, in a weedy shallow, the peaceful
dabchicks were feeding. Far off on a post toward the middle of the lake
stood a cormorant. But I could not keep my eyes long at once in that
direction. The dismal swamp had me under its spell, and meanwhile the
patient buzzards looked at me. "It is almost time," they said; "the
fever will do its work,"--and I began to believe it. It was too bad to
come away; the stupid town offered no attraction; but it seemed perilous
to remain. Perhaps I _could_ not come away. I would try it and see. It
was amazing that I could; and no sooner was I out in the sunshine than I
wished I had stayed where I was; for having once left the place, I was
never likely to find it again. The way was plain enough, to be sure, and
my feet would no doubt serve me. But the feet cannot do the mind's part,
and it is a sad fact, one of the saddest in life, that sensations cannot
be repeated.

With the fascination of the swamp still upon me, I heard somewhere in
the distance a musical voice, and soon came in sight of a garden where a
middle-aged negro was hoeing,--hoeing and singing: a wild, minor,
endless kind of tune; a hymn, as seemed likely from a word caught here
and there; a true piece of natural melody, as artless as any bird's. I
walked slowly to get more of it, and the happy-sad singer minded me not,
but kept on with his hoe and his song. Potatoes or corn, whatever his
crop may have been,--I did not notice, or, if I did, I have
forgotten,--it should have prospered under his hand.