their due and to speak more point-device, — the “rose-colored pastors”) do not at all respect the advice of James Hogg, for while eating they say much, looking the while most unfriendly. They have only just arrived from Syria, — indeed, in their far-off breeding cliffs, there are still young birds waiting for their wings before leaving for the East, — and they lose no time in announcing their arrival. The unhappy owner of the mulberry-grove yonder wages a bitter conflict with them, and from their numbers his pellet-bow thins out many a rosy thief. The red semul-tree is all aflame with burning scarlet, each branch a chandelier lit up with clusters of fiery blossom; and to it in the early heat come flocking, “with tongues all loudness,” a motley crowd of birds thirsting for the cool dew which has been all night collecting in the floral goblets and been sweetened by the semul’s honey. Among them the pastors revel, drinking, fighting, and chattering from early dawn to blazing noon. But as the sun strengthens all nature begins to confess the heat, and even the crow caws sadly. On the water the sun dances with such a blinding sparkle that the panoplied crocodile, apprehensive of asphyxia, will hardly show his scales above the river, and the turtles shut up their telescope necks, shrewdly suspecting a sunstroke. On the shaded hillside the herded pigs he dreamily grunting, and in the deep coverts the deer stretch themselves secure. The peasants in the fields have loosed their bullocks for a respite; and, while they make their way to the puddles, their masters creep under their grass huts to eat their meal, smoke their pipes, and doze.
But in the cities the heat of noon is worse. There is wanting even the relief of herbage and running water. The white sunlight lies upon the roads, so palpable a
