Six white eggs on a bed of hay,
Flecked with purple, a pretty sight!
There, as the mother sits all day,
Robert is singing with all his might:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Nice good wife that never goes out,
Keeping house while I frolic about.
Chee, chee, chee!”
Soon as the little ones chip the shell,
Six wide mouths are open for food;
Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well,
Gathering seeds for the hungry brood.
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Nobody knows but my mate and I
Where our nest and our nestlings lie.
Chee, chee, chee!”
Summer wanes; the children are grown;
Fun and frolic no more he knows;
Robert of Lincoln’s a humdrum crone;
Off he flies, and we sing as he goes:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
When you can pipe that merry old strain,
Robert of Lincoln, come back again.
Chee, chee, chee!”
— William Cullen Bryant.
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