Classic Poem

(Ortyx Virginianus.)

Morn with a roseate bloom hath fleck'd
The eastern sky with spangled gold;
The red October sun displays,
O'er purple hills and lonely bays,
And wood paths where the dun deer strays,
His flag of ruddy gold.
The gauzy mists, that all night threw
Their veil athwart the pure lake's breast,
In wreaths ascend heaven's dome of blue,
Or twine around each mountain crest
The silvery crowns of dew.

Sweet now at morn and eve the quail
Repeats his plaintive, whistling note,
And softly fall the answering cries
That over wood and corn-field float.
Now, sportsmen, with your gun and dog,
Forth in the early morning pass,
While yet the air is rich with blooms,
And wet with pearly dews the grass;
For now the bevies are abroad
To seek in stubble-fields their feed,
Or where the bushy covert drops
Its juicy wreath, its ripen'd seed.

Seek, then, where grassy tussocks bend
By sheltering hedge or thorny glade;
But best where sweet buckwheat was reap'd,
Or where the oats in swaths were laid.
Be cautious, silent in your tread,
For close, unseen, the coveys lie,
And when arous'd, on hurrying wing,
Straight to some briery hedge they fly,
Where, hid in thick impervious swale,
The hunter's skill may nought avail.

Be cool and steady when they rise,
Let no weak tremors shake thy nerve,
For swift and steady is their flight,
Their speedy wings may never swerve;
Sure be the eye, the finger true,
For never swifter victim flew.

First seek in open stubble-field,
Or where in grassy clumps they lie,
For then, alarm'd, in scatter'd flocks
To safer, denser coverts fly;
Then, singly rising from their lair,
" They leave their little lives in air. "

Go forth — all nature welcomes thee!
Now is a sweet, fresh autumn morn;
The blood-red sun shines thro' the haze
That veil'd the coming of the dawn.
The silver fretwork of the frost
Still glitters white on grass and fern;
The air is balmy in its breath,
The woods with autumn colorings burn.
The painter's palette may not catch
The scarlet o'er the maples spread,
Vie with the russet of the oaks,
Or purple o'er the dogwoods shed.
All nature, with benignant hand,
Beckons thee forth with magic wand.