[Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn by Lafcadio Hearn]@TWC D-Link book
Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn

CHAPTER X
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I suppose that the small number of poems in English about crickets can be partly explained by the scarcity of night singers.

Only the house cricket seems to be very well known.

But on the other hand, we can not so well explain the rarity of composition in regard to the day-singers--the grasshoppers and locusts which can be heard, though somewhat faintly, in any English country place after sunset during the warm season.

Another queer thing is that the example set by Keats has not been imitated or at least followed even up to the present time.
The poetry of earth is never dead: When all the birds are faint with the hot sun, etc.
In this charming composition you will have noticed the word "stove"; but you must remember that this is not a stove as we understand the term now, and signifies only an old-fashioned fireplace of brick or tile.

In Keats's day there were no iron stoves.


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