Quail

SOFTLY! See, far ahead, across our way. Those silent forms pass swiftly out of sight. So noiseless that the breezes seem affright. Breathless a moment ere the leaves they sway. In all their war-paint's glorious array, With feathered head-dress nodding in the light. They glide before us like a vision bright, And as a vision swiftly are away. But now and then among the vines and brush A dusky form seems darting to and fro. Was that a waving scalp-lock on the rush? What is it stirs beside that bush, there, low? Then lightning-like and thunder-loud, and, oh!— The heart stands still—ah!—valley quail at flush. —Charles Elmer Jenney