Little Rivers [6]
repeats the same thought almost in the
same words:
"A soft and lulling sound is heard
Of streams inaudible by day."
And Tennyson, in the valley of Cauteretz, tells of the river
"Deepening his voice with deepening of the night."
It is in this mystical hour that you will hear the most celestial
and entrancing of all bird-notes, the songs of the thrushes,--the
hermit, and the wood-thrush, and the veery. Sometimes, but not
often, you will see the singers. I remember once, at the close of
a beautiful day's fishing on the Swiftwater, I came out, just after
sunset, into a little open space in an elbow of the stream. It was
still early spring, and the leaves were tiny. On the top of a
small sumac, not thirty feet away from me, sat a veery. I could
see the pointed spots upon his breast, the swelling of his white
throat, and the sparkle of his eyes, as he poured his whole heart
into a long liquid chant, the clear notes rising and falling,
echoing and interlacing in endless curves of sound,
"Orb within orb, intricate, wonderful."
Other bird-songs can be translated into words, but not this. There
is no interpretation. It is music,--as Sidney Lanier defines it,--
"Love in search of a word."
But it is not only to the real life of birds and flowers that the
little rivers introduce you. They lead you often into familiarity
with human nature in undress, rejoicing in the liberty of old
clothes, or of none at all. People do not mince along the banks of
streams in patent-leather shoes or crepitating silks. Corduroy and
home-spun and flannel are the stuffs that suit this region; and the
frequenters of these paths go their natural gaits, in calf-skin or
rubber boots, or bare-footed. The girdle of conventionality is
laid aside, and the skirts rise with the spirits.
A stream that flows through a country of upland farms will show you
many a pretty bit of genre painting. Here is the laundry-pool at
the foot of the kitchen garden, and the tubs are set upon a few
planks close to the water, and the farmer's daughters, with bare
arms and gowns tucked up, are wringing out the clothes. Do you
remember what happened to Ralph Peden in The Lilac Sunbonnet when
he came on a scene like this? He tumbled at once into love with
Winsome Charteris,--and far over his head.
And what a pleasant thing it is to see a little country lad riding
one of the plough-horses to water, thumping his naked heels against
the ribs of his stolid steed, and pulling hard on the halter as if
it were the bridle of Bucephalus! Or perhaps it is a riotous
company of boys that have come down to the old swimming-hole, and
are now splashing and gambolling through the water like a drove of
white seals very much sun-burned. You had hoped to catch a goodly
trout in that hole, but what of that? The sight of a harmless hour
of mirth is better than a fish, any day.
Possibly you will overtake another fisherman on the stream. It may
be one of those fabulous countrymen, with long cedar poles and bed-
cord lines, who are commonly reported to catch such enormous
strings of fish, but who rarely, so far as my observation goes, do
anything more than fill their pockets with fingerlings. The
trained angler, who uses the finest tackle, and drops his fly on
the water as accurately as Henry James places a word in a story, is
the man who takes the most and the largest fish in the long run.
Perhaps the fisherman ahead of you is such an one,--a man whom you
have known in town as a lawyer or a doctor, a merchant or a
preacher, going about his business in the hideous respectability of
a high silk hat and a long black coat. How good it is to see him
now in the freedom of a flannel shirt and a broad-brimmed gray felt
with flies stuck around the band.
In Professor John Wilson's Essays Critical and Imaginative, there
same words:
"A soft and lulling sound is heard
Of streams inaudible by day."
And Tennyson, in the valley of Cauteretz, tells of the river
"Deepening his voice with deepening of the night."
It is in this mystical hour that you will hear the most celestial
and entrancing of all bird-notes, the songs of the thrushes,--the
hermit, and the wood-thrush, and the veery. Sometimes, but not
often, you will see the singers. I remember once, at the close of
a beautiful day's fishing on the Swiftwater, I came out, just after
sunset, into a little open space in an elbow of the stream. It was
still early spring, and the leaves were tiny. On the top of a
small sumac, not thirty feet away from me, sat a veery. I could
see the pointed spots upon his breast, the swelling of his white
throat, and the sparkle of his eyes, as he poured his whole heart
into a long liquid chant, the clear notes rising and falling,
echoing and interlacing in endless curves of sound,
"Orb within orb, intricate, wonderful."
Other bird-songs can be translated into words, but not this. There
is no interpretation. It is music,--as Sidney Lanier defines it,--
"Love in search of a word."
But it is not only to the real life of birds and flowers that the
little rivers introduce you. They lead you often into familiarity
with human nature in undress, rejoicing in the liberty of old
clothes, or of none at all. People do not mince along the banks of
streams in patent-leather shoes or crepitating silks. Corduroy and
home-spun and flannel are the stuffs that suit this region; and the
frequenters of these paths go their natural gaits, in calf-skin or
rubber boots, or bare-footed. The girdle of conventionality is
laid aside, and the skirts rise with the spirits.
A stream that flows through a country of upland farms will show you
many a pretty bit of genre painting. Here is the laundry-pool at
the foot of the kitchen garden, and the tubs are set upon a few
planks close to the water, and the farmer's daughters, with bare
arms and gowns tucked up, are wringing out the clothes. Do you
remember what happened to Ralph Peden in The Lilac Sunbonnet when
he came on a scene like this? He tumbled at once into love with
Winsome Charteris,--and far over his head.
And what a pleasant thing it is to see a little country lad riding
one of the plough-horses to water, thumping his naked heels against
the ribs of his stolid steed, and pulling hard on the halter as if
it were the bridle of Bucephalus! Or perhaps it is a riotous
company of boys that have come down to the old swimming-hole, and
are now splashing and gambolling through the water like a drove of
white seals very much sun-burned. You had hoped to catch a goodly
trout in that hole, but what of that? The sight of a harmless hour
of mirth is better than a fish, any day.
Possibly you will overtake another fisherman on the stream. It may
be one of those fabulous countrymen, with long cedar poles and bed-
cord lines, who are commonly reported to catch such enormous
strings of fish, but who rarely, so far as my observation goes, do
anything more than fill their pockets with fingerlings. The
trained angler, who uses the finest tackle, and drops his fly on
the water as accurately as Henry James places a word in a story, is
the man who takes the most and the largest fish in the long run.
Perhaps the fisherman ahead of you is such an one,--a man whom you
have known in town as a lawyer or a doctor, a merchant or a
preacher, going about his business in the hideous respectability of
a high silk hat and a long black coat. How good it is to see him
now in the freedom of a flannel shirt and a broad-brimmed gray felt
with flies stuck around the band.
In Professor John Wilson's Essays Critical and Imaginative, there