roat had waved with melody in vain. He had worn
his welcome out. Even the virtues which should have throbbed, tender
and all-embracing, under priestly vestments, had no tenderness, no
embrace for him,--only a mockery and a prophecy, a cold and cynical
prediction that I should soon tire of his shrill voice. Yes, Cheri,
your sweet silver trills, your rippling June-brook warbles, were to him
only a shrew's scolding. I took the bird wrathfully, his name had been
Cherry, and rechristened him on the spot Cheri, in anticipation of the
new life that was to dawn upon him, no longer despised Cherry, but
Cheri, my cherished one.

He has been with me now nearly a year, and every trick of his voice and
head and tail is just as fresh, graceful, and charming as on the first
day of his arrival. He is a constant recreation and delight. I put
him in my own room, and went up to look at him two or three times the
first evening. Every time I looked he would be quite still, but his
little black beads of eyes shone wide open in the candle-light, and I
recalled how Chaucer's

"Smale foules maken melodie
That slepen alle night with open eye,"

and reflected that Cheri certainly made melodie enough in the daytime
to be ranked with the poetic tribe; but one night, after he had been
here long enough to have worn away his nervous excitement, I happened
to go into the room very softly, and the black beads had disappeared.
The tiny head had disappeared, too, and only a little round ball of
feathers was balanced on his perch. Then I remembered that chickens
have a way of putting their heads in their pockets when they go to
sleep, and poetry yielded to poultry, Cheri stepped out of Chaucer, and
took his place in the hencoop.

He has had an eventful life since he came to me. In the summer I hung
him on a hook under piazza for the merry company of robins and
bluebirds, which he enjoyed excessively. One day, in the midst of a
most successful concert, an envious gust swept down the cage, up went
the door, and out flew the frightened bird. I could have borne to lose
him, but I was sure he would lose himself,--a tender little dilettante,
served a prince all the days of his life, never having to lift a finger
to help himself, or knowing a want unsatisfied. Now, thrown suddenly
upon his own resources, homeless, friendless, forlorn, how could ever
make his fortune in this bleak New England, for all he has, according
to Cuvier, more brain