the stubble and other
refuse of the season before his "fall plowing."

46. The single crow, etc.: Note the full significance of this detail
of the picture. Compare Bryant's _Death of the Flowers:_

"And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day."

50. Compare with this stanza the pretty little poem, _The Birch Tree._

68. Lavish of their long-hid gold: The chestnut leaves, it will be
remembered, turn to a bright golden yellow in autumn. These
descriptions of autumn foliage are all as true as beautiful.

73. Maple-swamps: We generally speak of the swamp-maple, which grows
in low ground, and has particularly brilliant foliage in autumn.

82. Tangled blackberry: This is the creeping blackberry of course,
which every one remembers whose feet have been caught in its prickly
tangles.

91. Martyr oak: The oak is surrounded with the blazing foliage of
the ivy, like a burning martyr.

99. Dear marshes: The Charles River near Elmwood winds through broad
salt marshes, the characteristic features of which Lowell describes
with minute and loving fidelity.

127. Bobolink: If Lowell had a favorite bird, it was the bobolink,
although the oriole was a close competitor for his praises. In one of
his letters he says: "I think the bobolink the best singer in the
world, even undervaluing the lark and the nightingale in the
comparison." And in another he writes: "That liquid tinkle of theirs
is the true fountain of youth if one can only drink it with the right
ears, and I always date the New Year from the day of my first draught.
Messer Roberto di Lincoln, with his summer alb over his shoulders, is
the true chorister for the bridals of earth and sky. There is no bird
that seems to me so thoroughly happy as he, so void of all _arriere
pensee_ about getting a livelihood. The robin sings matins and vespers
somewhat conscientiously, it seems to me--makes a business of it and
pipes as it were by the yard--but Bob squanders song like a poet."

Compare the description in _Sunthin' in the Pastoral Line:_

"'Nuff said, June's bridesman, poet o' the year,
Gladness on wings, the bobolink, is here;
Half hid in tip-top apple-blooms he swings,
Or climbs aginst the breeze with quiverin' wings,
Or, givin' way to 't in a mock despair,
Runs down, a brook o' laughter, thru the air."

See also the opening lines of _Under the Willows_ for another
description full of the ecstasy of both bird and poet.