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I rushed towards her.... But already she had fluttered out of window, and darted away.... In the garden, in a thicket of lilac bushes, a wood-dove greeted her with its first morning warble ... and where she vanished, the milk-white sky flushed a soft pink. I know thee, Goddess of Fantasy! Thou didst pay me a random visit by the way; thou hast flown on to the young poets. O Poesy! Youth!
"I am sure this was not a hard ride at all, Alessandro! Is this where we are to stay?" Alessandro turned a compassionate look upon her. "How little does the wood-dove know of rough places!" he said. "This is only the beginning; hardly is it even the beginning." Fastening his pony to a bush, he reconnoitred the place, disappearing from sight the moment he entered the chaparral in any direction.
My father put out his hands in deprecation; or as if desiring to thrust from him a host of thronging, battling thoughts. Still, came faintly down at intervals the tiny voice, dropping into a soft coo of pleasure, like a wood-dove in its nest every mother knows the sound. And then Mrs. Halifax entered holding in her arms her little winter flower, her baby daughter.
Her voice was soft and musical as the cooing of a wood-dove, and the sweet full notes chimed in striking contrast to her uncouth speech. But Joan's diction gave pleasure to the listener. It had freedom and wildness, and was almost wholly innocent of any petrifying educational influences. Joan, for her part, felt at ease. The man was so polite and so humble.
The rapid, chattering flourish of the bob-o'-link, the soft whistle of the thrush, the tender coo of the wood-dove, the deep, warbling bass of the grouse, the drumming of the partridge, the melodious trill of the lark, the gay carol of the robin, the friendly, familiar call of the duck and the teal, resound from tree and knoll and lowland, prompting the expressive exclamation of the simple half-breed,
One summer evening they were returning from the fields together, the sun was sinking in the west, the Ettrick murmured along by their side, and the voice of the wood-dove was heard from the copse-wood which covered the hills. "Why are you so sad, brother Philip?" said Mary; "would you hide anything from your own sister?" "Do not call me brother, Mary," said he earnestly "do not call me brother!"
I knew it was that," and into his eyes there came an expression of tenderness and a far-away look as though the word recalled memories of other days. Memories which music or the glories of the sunset, or the cooing of the wood-dove at eventide might awaken within the soul. The sunlight played along the path at their feet.
The spell and magic of the land seemed to hold like an unseen hand all things as in the grip of a vice, and were no less potent in the present than they were in the past. The plaintive notes of the wood-dove found a response within Bessie's soul. The winds seemed laden with new voices and unconsciously interrupted the train of her thoughts and caused her to pause and listen and wonder.
Rabbits came creeping out of bush and bracken, a wood-dove began her moan, two or three deer stood up. Then Prosper thought "If the beasts come to prayers, it behoves me as a Christian man to hear Mass also. Moreover, it were fitting that adventure should begin in that manner, to be undertaken in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ."
J. M. Lester, in a paper read before the Rugby School Natural History Society observes: "The wood-dove, when perched amongst the branches of its favourite fir, is scarcely discernible; whereas, were it among some lighter foliage the blue and purple tints in its plumage would far sooner betray it.
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