Algy thoroughly enjoyed his wind-driven ride in the old downy birch tree, but after a while he began

Algy thoroughly enjoyed his wind-driven ride in the old downy birch tree, but after a while he began to feel hungry again, for he had only managed to eat a few rowan berries before the wind had defeated him.Fortunately there was a handsome cotoneaster growing close to the birch, and it was absolutely smothered in beautiful red berries which the other birds had not yet removed. A single hop and a flutter took Algy into the centre of the bush, where, seating himself comfortably, he began to eat a very hearty lunch, reflecting the while on Nature’s generosity towards fluffy (and other) birds.Algy was inevitably reminded of John Keats’ famous Ode, but despite the mellow fruitfulness which was so abundantly evident in his assistants’ garden this year, other aspects of the poem did not quite seem to fit the character of autumn in the wild west Highlands. Algy guessed that the young poet had had a more southerly clime in mind, for he knew that even back in Mr. Keats’ day the Hebridean coast and islands of Scotland were known for their stormy autumn weather. Algy recalled that entries for September days in James Boswell’s 1773 diary The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson (published in 1785) were full of observations such as “It was a storm of wind and rain; so we could not set out“… and very little seemed to have changed in that respect as the centuries had passed…However, the poem conjured up a splendid vision of plenty, albeit in a mythical land of warm sunshine, and Algy was happy to recite it for the benefit of the other birds while he munched the ripe red berries. Mr. Keats had got one thing right at least: the red-breast was indeed whistling from a garden croft, and Algy was thrilled to be hearing his wee friend’s song once again:Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run; To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees, And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees, Until they think warm days will never cease, For Summer has o'er-brimm’d their clammy cells.Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep, Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers; And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep Steady thy laden head across a brook; Or by a cyder-press, with patient look, Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? Think not of them, thou hast thy music too - While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day, And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn Among the river sallows, borne aloft Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies; And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.[Algy is quoting the famous poem To Autumn by the early 19th century English poet John Keats.] -- source link

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