Отрывок из книги
Winthrop Packard
Published by Good Press, 2021
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No one believes that there will be dawn at all. You cannot prove it by the wood thrush. He sings best, indeed he sings only, in the shadow, and often even in the darkest night he will send out a bell-like note or two that has a soothing, sleepy tintinnabulation as of cow-bells shaken afar off by drowsy cattle. No, the wood thrush is not a reliable witness, but if you are wise in the ways of field and pasture before dawn, you may take evidence from the chipping sparrow. He is the earliest as he is one of the smallest of the morn-waking birds. In his case the least shall be first. I do not know if he really sees the dawn or if he smells it. There is a change in the air before there is in the sky, and perhaps he notes it. Perhaps, too, being smaller, he needs less sleep than the other birds, and his gentle inquiring note is a plaint that the night is long rather than a prophecy that it is ending. But it is he that first predicts with certainty the coming day, and it will be many minutes after his first call before the growing luminosity, a sort of pale halo that looms slowly about all things, tells you that the sun is indeed coming. Even then you are likely to hear no other bird note for what seems a long time.
Then from a treetop in the open comes a sort of surprised ejaculation, as if some one said, “Why, bless me! It is morning already,” and then a burst of song from the full throat of a robin. It is as if he were the chorister of a choir invisible, for he pipes but a single strain before from treetop to treetop, near and heaven only knows how far, bursts forth the mingled melody of a great chorus of robins ringing clarion notes of jubilee.
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