HOW THE ROBIN CAME
BANISHED FROM MASSACHUSETTS
THE BROWN DWARF OF RUGEN




NOTE.-The portrait prefixed to this volume was etched by
S. A. Schoff, in 1888, after a painting by Bass Otis, a pupil of
Gilbert Stuart, made in the winter of 1836-1837.




PROEM

I LOVE the old melodious lays
Which softly melt the ages through,
The songs of Spenser's golden days,
Arcadian Sidney's silvery phrase,
Sprinkling our noon of time with freshest morning dew.

Yet, vainly in my quiet hours
To breathe their marvellous notes I try;
I feel them, as the leaves and flowers
In silence feel the dewy showers,
And drink with glad, still lips the blessing of the sky.

The rigor of a frozen clime,
The harshness of an untaught ear,