He has drawn all the ideas of his stanzas from the early morning phenomena
of those critical weeks when the loud plantation-horn is blown
before daylight, in order to rouse all hands for a long day's fight
against the common enemy of cotton-planting mankind.
"In addition to these exegetical commentaries the Northern reader
probably needs to be informed that the phrase `peerten up' means substantially
`to spur up', and is an active form of the adjective `peert'
(probably a corruption of `pert'), which is so common in the South,
and which has much the signification of `smart' in New England, as e.g.,
a `peert' horse, in antithesis to a `sorry' -- i.e., poor, mean, lazy one."
The Mocking-bird
Superb and sole, upon a plumed spray [1]
That o'er the general leafage boldly grew,
He summ'd the woods in song; or typic drew
The watch of hungry hawks, the lone dismay
Of languid doves when long their lovers stray,
And all birds' passion-plays that sprinkle dew
At morn in brake or bosky avenue.
What e'er birds did or dreamed, this bird could say.
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