December, 1883), L. V. (`So. Lit. Mes.', 10. 414, July, 1844),
Walt Whitman (`Burroughs', l.c., also in Whitman's `Poems'), R. H. Wilde
(`Burroughs', l.c., and Stedman & Hutchinson's `Am. Lit.', vol. 5).

Roughly speaking, the poems may be divided into two classes --
first those that, as in the Indian legend cited below,
make out the mocking-bird only or chiefly a thief and thing of evil,
and second those that find him, though a borrower, original and great.
The former view, fortunately upheld by few, is strikingly set forth
in Granald's `The Mock-bird and the Sparrow'. After describing minutely
the various songs of the mocking-bird and emphasizing
that they all come from other birds, the author gives the dialogue
between the mock-bird and the sparrow. The former taunted the latter
and insisted on his singing; and

"The sparrow cock'd a knowing eye,
And made him this most tart reply --
`You steal from all and call it wit,
But I prefer my simple "twit".'"

But the latter view is espoused by most of the writers mentioned,
notably and nobly by Drake, the Haynes, the Laniers, Lee, Meek, and Thompson,
the poet-laureate of the mocking-bird, whose poems should be read
by every lover of nature and especially of the mocking-bird.
As Thompson's tributes are all too long for quotation, I give here Meek's,
in the hope that I may rescue it from the long oblivion of an out-of-print.
My attention was called to it by my friend, Dr. C. H. Ross,
to whom every reader will be indebted along with myself. It runs as follows:

"From the vale, what music ringing,