I'm the "Chat." You've heard me if you haven't seen me. But there
isn't a better lookin' bird in our wood, either. My olive-green coat
is a beauty. My yellow satin vest would dazzle your eyes. And my white
china spectacles are heirlooms in our family. My wife dresses just
as handsome as I do. I'm a prey to high spirits. Some folk call me
a "wag." Don't know what that is, but I don't see the use in bein'
doleful. Why, when I get back from Mexico, I feel obliged to holler. So
I just holler. The way old Mother Earth rigs up in the Spring makes me
full of life. I get down and cool my legs in the deep grass. It brings
my appetite back a-whizzin'. My! If I don't eat a thousand bugs a day.
"Juicy" don't describe 'em. Then I climb a tree-top and holler. If I
eat a thousand bugs seems like I have to give two thousand hollers.
I holler straight through a moonlight night. You see, I hate to let
old Whippoorwill think he's the only bird alive. Mornin' after folks
stop talkin' 'bout how bad they slept and say, "What's that?" somebody
says, "That's the Chat." Then they always laugh. And I laugh, too--a
very Falstaffian laugh, as if I'se shakin' great fat sides out of their
accordion plaits. Then I give a beautiful whistle. And they say, "Now,
what's that?" The fellow I know says, "That's the Chat." Then I give a
surprised whistle, just as if you stepped on a tack or took a drink of
red-hot coffee. And they say, "And what's that?" And the wise man says,
"That's the Chat again." Well, says the other fellow, "I'll never know
that bird." But the bad sleeper says, "Well, you would if he kept you
awake all last night as he did me. He never knows when to stop." But
even that fellow will never know when I've said my last word!
These rag folks are awful stupids, anyhow. I call 'em "blunderers."
Do more harm than good wherever they're at. My wife knits our house
among thorns just to plague 'em. They hate to get their rags torn.
Then they'd better keep scarce of our door. If it ain't in blackberry
jungles it's in catbrier tangles. I could yarn from sun-up to sundown
'bout how rag folks come blunderin' round interferin'. Barrin' o cat's,
they've got the most meddlesome forefeet I ever saw. But it ain't
often they find us. Cause why? We keep still. Our next-door neighbor's
Dame Indigo. Can't a body go by she don't pop up scoldin' like a house
afire. Then they blunder round till they find her nest-eggs, too! Lots
of other feather-heads just like her! There's Topknot Cardnal makes
such a fuss anybody'd know he's got something to hide. Sure enough,
he's had such lots of kin behind the bars it makes him scary. But I'd
show more pluck, anyhow.
Once this summer a blunderer smarter'n common came along by us. We had
a nice place, too, in a dreadful blackberry tangle. A small sassafras
threw a nice shadow over it when the sun got hot. Well, I shut up
quick, I tell you. Was just tellin' Mrs. Chat a few things while she
kep' an eye on our four eggs like. We kep' still as mice. But didn't
that blunderin' rags march right up to our door and push and scratch
till she saw what we had? Had a little rag blunderer with her. An' she
held her up to look in, too. Every single feather we had stood on end!
It was good riddance when they went along. Couldn't believe my specs
when I saw they had left our eggs alone. Seven suns after, big rags
came back. We're in a peck o' trouble. Our four bairns just out the
shell. We both had to scratch round with all our toes to feed and keep
'em breathin'. Been rainin' for a solid week. Dame Chat said she just
knew they'd get a chill and die. But the blunderin' party didn't stay
long.
Well, sir, we hadn't got rid of that blunderer yet. The nex' time she
brought another, bigger one, along. Both crowded up and looked in
our door. You never saw such beauties as our bairns that day. Just
gettin' so plump and featherin' right along. But it meant a sight o'
work for us. They just sat and took in every mouthful we could rake
and scrape. They kep' us busy. Well, when these blunderin' rags shook
the house the bairns all up and spread their jaws wide open. Rags
thought it was awful cute, but I'm thankful they didn't offer to feed
'em anything. Did bad enough, anyhow. Big one said, "Why don't you
take their picture?" First rags said she couldn't. Second rags said
she'd try, anyhow. With that, first rags began to snap off our best
defenses--without so much as by your leave. They scratched her good,
anyhow; for she said so. Well, she put some kind of square black gun
right up to our door. Dame Chat went into hysterics and those little
Chats just boiled over like a teakettle and went out the nest in four
different directions! The two blunderers went off in a hurry, both
talkin' at once and one suckin' her paw. Thankful to say ain't ever
seen 'em since. But Dame Chat's a nervous wreck from the fright they
gave her; and I'm worked to skin and bone takin' care of the little
Chats. I just wish all the town's fenced in so's blunderers couldn't
get loose to meddle round in their bunglin', elephant, rhinoceros way!
Elizabeth Nunemacher.
* * * * *
He comes--he comes--the Frost Spirit comes! You may trace his
footsteps now
On the naked woods and the blasted fields, and the brown hill's
withered brow.
He has smitten the leaves of the gray old trees where their
pleasant green came forth,
And the winds, which follow wherever he goes, have shaken them down
to earth.
--John Greenleaf Whittier.