In nesting time, at evening, a very few have heard the "luxurious nuptial song" of the ovenbird; but it is a song to haunt the memory forever afterward. Burroughs appears to be the first writer to record this "rare bit of bird melody." "Mounting by easy flight to the top of the tallest tree," says the author of "Wake-Robin," "the ovenbird launches into the air with a sort of suspended, hovering flight, like certain of the finches, and bursts into a perfect ecstasy of song -- clear, ringing, copious, rivalling the goldfinch's in vivacity and the linnet's in melody."英文原著 · 《Bird Neighbors》
Then show'd he him the little earth that here is, *To regard* the heaven's quantity; *by comparison with And after show'd he him the nine spheres; <5> And after that the melody heard he, That cometh of those spheres thrice three, That wells of music be and melody In this world here, and cause of harmony.英文原著 · 《The Canterbury Tales》
After awhile my companion began, catlike, to purr to himself a song. Its melody, the melody of "the moon withdrew behind a cloud," was familiar enough, but not so the words, which ran:英文原著 · 《Through Russia》
O fair! O sweet! when I do look on thee, In whom all joys so well agree, Sweet, think not I am at ease, For because my chief part singeth; This song from death's sorrow springeth: As to swan in last disease: For no dumbness, nor death, bringeth Stay to true love's melody: Heart and soul do sing in me.英文原著 · 《A Defence of Poesie and Poems》
I led her across to an open window. The dancers were whirling by us. The waltz was one of those melancholy ones which speak the spirit of the dance more elo- quently than any merry melody can. The sound of the sea booming beyond in the darkness came to us, and long paths of light, now red, now green, stretched toward the distant light-house. These were the lines I repeated: --英文原著 · 《A Mountain Woman》
But the next scene had warmer tints. It was the interior of a rich room, -- crimson and amber fabrics, flowers, the gleam of a statue beyond the drapings; the sound of a tender piano unflinging a familiar melody, and a woman. She was just a part of all the luxury.英文原著 · 《A Mountain Woman》