What a pair! yet they
are well related. A finer bloom than the foam bell in an eddying pool
is this little bird. We may miss the meaning of the loud-resounding
torrent, but the flute-like voice of the bird--only love is in it.
A few robins, belated on their way down from the upper Meadows, linger
in the Valley and make out to spend the winter in comparative comfort,
feeding on the mistletoe berries that grow on the oaks. In the depths
of the great forests, on the high meadows, in the severest altitudes,
they seem as much at home as in the fields and orchards about the busy
habitations of man, ascending the Sierra as the snow melts, following
the green footsteps of Spring, until in July or August the highest
glacier meadows are reached on the summit of the Range. Then, after the
short summer is over, and their work in cheering and sweetening these
lofty wilds is done, they gradually make their way down again in accord
with the weather, keeping below the snow-storms, lingering here and
there to feed on huckleberries and frost-nipped wild cherries growing
on the upper slopes. Thence down to the vineyards and orchards of the
lowlands to spend the winter; entering the gardens of the great towns
as well as parks and fields, where the blessed wanderers are too often
slaughtered for food--surely a bad use to put so fine a musician to;
better make stove wood of pianos to feed the kitchen fire.
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