Some flocks count up to thousands,
I know, and when they fly,
Their tiny wings make rustle,
As if a wind went by.
They go as quickly as they come,
Go in a night or day ;
Soon as the snow has melted off,
The darlings fly away,
But come again, again, again,
All Winter, with each snow ;
Brave little armies, through the cold,
Swift back and forth they go.
I always wondered where they lived
In Summer, till last year
I stumbled on them in their home,
High in the upper air ;
'Way up among the clouds it was,
A many thousand feet,
But on the mountain-side gay flowers
Were blooming fresh and sweet.
Great pine-trees' swaying branches
Gave cool and fragrant shade ;
And here, we found, the snow-birds
Their Summer home had made.
" Oh, lucky little snow-birds! "
We said, " to know so well,
In Summer time and Winter time,
Your destined place to dwell---
" To journey, nothing doubting,
Down to the barren plains,
Where harvests are all over,
To find your garnered grains!
" Oh, precious little snow-birds!
If we were half as wise,
If we were half as trusting
To the Father in the skies,---
" He would feed us, though the harvests
Had ceased throughout the land,
And hold us, all our lifetime,
In the hollow of his hand! "
--Helen Hunt Jackson
Roberts Brothers, 1876.