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<h1>BIRDS AND NATURE.</h1>
<h2>Vol. XI.</h2>
<h2 id="c1">FEBRUARY.</h2>
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<p class="t">But Winter has yet brighter scenes—he boasts</p>
<p class="t0">Splendors beyond what gorgeous summer knows;</p>
<p class="t0">Or Autumn with his many fruits, and woods</p>
<p class="t0">All flushed with many hues. Come when the rains</p>
<p class="t0">Have glazed the snow and clothed the trees with ice,</p>
<p class="t0">While the slant sun of February pours</p>
<p class="t0">Into the bowers a flood of light. Approach!</p>
<p class="t0">The incrusted surface shall upbear thy steps,</p>
<p class="t0">And the broad arching portals of the grove</p>
<p class="t0">Welcome thy entering. Look! the massy trunks</p>
<p class="t0">Are cased in the pure crystal; each light spray,</p>
<p class="t0">Nodding and tinkling in the breath of heaven,</p>
<p class="t0">Is studded with its trembling water-drops,</p>
<p class="t0">That glimmer with an amethystine light.</p>
<p class="t0">But round the parent-stem the long low boughs</p>
<p class="t0">Bend, in a glittering ring, and arbors hide</p>
<p class="t0">The glassy floor. Oh! you might deem the spot</p>
<p class="t0">The spacious cavern of some virgin mine,</p>
<p class="t0">Deep in the womb of earth—where the gems grow,</p>
<p class="t0">And diamonds put forth radiant rods and bud</p>
<p class="t0">While amethyst and topaz—and the place</p>
<p class="t0">Lit up, most royally, with the pure beam</p>
<p class="t0">That dwells in them. <span class="hst"><span class="gs">* * * *</span></span></p>
<p class="lr">—William Cullen Bryant, “A Winter Piece.”</p>
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