Sopranos--roosters; altos--pigeons,
and ducks; tenors--goats; bassos--cows, and one donkey. There was
nothing missing to make a full, rich volume of sound. Of course
there is no place where it is so difficult to get a long, refreshing
night's sleep as the country.
One rarely comes through any new experience with all one's preconceived
ideas intact. Our first season on the Sabine Farm shattered a number of
mine. I had always supposed that a mocking-bird, like a garden, was "a
lovesome thing, God wot." Romantic--just one step below a nightingale!
There was a thicket of bamboos close to my window, and every night all
the young mocking-birds gathered there to try out their voices. It was
partly elocutionary and partly vocal, but almost entirely
exercises--rarely did they favor me with a real song. This would go on
for some time, then just as I dared to hope that lessons were over,
another burst of ill-assorted trills and shrills would rouse me to fury.
I kept three pairs of boots in a convenient place, and hurled them into
the bamboos, paying the boys a small reward for retrieving them each
morning. Sometimes, if my aim was good, a kind of wondering silence
lasted long enough for me to fall asleep.
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