Tho’ I still kin see the trouble o’ the PRESUNT, I kin see—­
Kindo’ like my sight wuz double-all the things that
      ust to be;
And the flutter o’ the robin and the teeter o’ the wren
Sets the willer-branches bobbin’ “howdy-do” thum Now
    to Then!

The deadnin’ and the thicket’s jest a-bilin’ full of June,
From the rattle o’ the cricket, to the yallar-hammer’s
    tune;
And the catbird in the bottom, and the sapsuck on the
    snag,
Seems ef they can’t-od-rot ’em!-jest do nothin’ else
    but brag!

They’s music in the twitter of the bluebird and the jay,
And that sassy little critter jest a-peckin’ all the day;
They’s music in the “flicker,” and they’s music in the
    thrush,
And they’s music in the snicker o’ the chipmunk in the
    brush!

They’s music all around me!—­And I go back, in a dream
Sweeter yit than ever found me fast asleep,—­and in the
    stream
That list to split the medder whare the dandylions
    growed,
I stand knee-deep, and redder than the sunset down the
    road.

Then’s when I’ b’en a-fishin’!—­And they’s other fellers,
    too,
With theyr hick’ry-poles a-swishin’ out behind ’em; and
    a few
Little “shiners” on our stringers, with theyr tails tip—­
    toein’ bloom,
As we dance ’em in our fingers all the happy jurney
    home.

I kin see us, true to Natur’, thum the time we started out,
With a biscuit and a ’tater in our little “roundabout"!—­
I kin see our lines a-tanglin’, and our elbows in a jam,
And our naked legs a-danglin’ thum the apern o’ the dam.

I kin see the honeysuckle climbin’ up around the mill,
And kin hear the worter chuckle, and the wheel a-growl-
    in’ still;
And thum the bank below it I kin steal the old canoe,
And jest git in and row it like the miller ust to do.

W’y, I git my fancy focussed on the past so mortul plane
I kin even smell the locus’-blossoms bloomin’ in the lane;
And I hear the cow-bells clinkin’ sweeter tunes ’n
    “Money-musk"’
Fer the lightnin’ bugs a-blinkin’ and a-dancin’ in the dusk.

And when I’ve kep’ on “musin’,” as the feller says, tel I’m
Firm-fixed in the conclusion that they haint no better
    time,
When you come to cipher on it, than the old times,—­I
    de-clare
I kin wake and say “dog-gone-it’” jest as soft as any
    prayer!