Activate Javascript or update your browser for the full Digital Library experience.
Previous Page
–
Next Page
OCR
As I look back and think of the springof last
‘ear it seemed to havebegun the moment that
the late snow had melted, which did not come
till mid-January.‘ It came suddenly one mom-
ing with a feathery wreath of whiteness‘, so soft
and plenteous-and unlike the tinselly conven-
tionsof tbeChristmas cards. -The darkestrooms
in the house shone as with -a second’ sunlight,
and the trees looked thick and bushy as though
with a polar summer of foliage.‘ The air was
very keen indeed that rnoming, and-perhaps
the tiny squirrel, with its reckless ‘display of
tail framing its long narrow body in. aband-
some bush, knew what was cormng as it flashed
restlessly across the path to disappear swiftly
up a high tree where it rested safely out of
reach of a too admiring crowd of small boys.
Its pretty tail erect, high above its tiny head
was a sight to delight in, as was the way it
s rang from end to end of thecopse in a mid-
air progression, never missing aim as it threaded
its wa among the tree-tops. '
In ndon February always seemed quite a
winter month, but here, in the depths of the
count , after the ice-bound days before it we
have ‘felt in it the stirrings of the sap and
counted it with the siring. It lS.Il0K that
F cbniary is a month o colour or ofwide-spread
scents. It has none of the melting richness
that goes with waning and decay, but the rare
and pure hues of crocus andhepatica, snow-
dro and aconite have the clear tone that tells
of ife and growth to come. The reds and
purples of the berry-harvest have fed the hungry
THE GIRLS OWN PAPER.
SPRING MEMORIES.
birds and been stored
in the hoards of the
squirrels such as that
one who is nibbling a
hasty breakfast under the
walnut-tree on the lawn.
The hedges are still bare
and bleak, but look lower
' down, and you will agree
with me that February is
the month for ditches.
The cleaver or goose-
grass clothes it in a fairy
dress of freshest green,
and the delicate baby-
fingers go climbing up
the moist bank until the
black twigs above look
as if the message of
spring had sounded into
t eir hearts. ‘Ve can
forgive the way it chokes
our red anemones in the
garden in May for its
witchery now. Peep in-
to that catch-water under
the sallows by the marsh
road as we jog slowly
past in the donkey-cart.
How beautiful that great
blue-green drooping
clump of leafage is. I
think it is the chervil,
but it is hard to dis-
tinguish the umbelliferae
until you can look either
at the flowers, the seeds,
or the stalks. The hem-
lock tribe are a bewilder-
ing cousinship, but the
seasons would be poor
without them.
Another early hedge-
row friend is the ground-
ivy with its sturdy little
dark-green woolly leaves
that push their way every-
where, “amongst which
come forth the floures,
gaping like little hoods, not unlike those of
germauder, of a ur lisli blew colour,” says
Gerrard. “ Mixe with a little ale and honey
and strained it takes away the pinne and webbc,
and any griefe in the eyes of horse and cow,”
he continues, with other minuter directions;
“but I list not to be over eloquent among
gentlewomen, to whom especially my works
are most necessarie,” and so we must not depart
from his method towards “ our girls ” of to-day.
Perhaps it was this use that gave the ground-
ivyits other name of ale-hoofe. But a gayer sign
in the hedge-bank to tell us that “ sumer is a
comen-in ” is the shining celandine that flashes
out suddenly and keeps a brave show among
moist twigs and all the tokens of winter‘s
departing train. The dark glossy leaves are as
handsome as some of spring’s gayest plants,
‘Veil may “"ordsworth say-
“Ere a leaf is on the bush,
In the time before the thrush
Has a thought about her nest,
Thou wilt come with half a call
Spreading out thy glossy breast
Like a careless prodigal;
Telling tales about the sun
“'hen we've little warmth or none."
Partly its sudden anival “about the kalends
of March,” as Gerrard says, and partly its own
starry dprofusion makes a warm glow of
gratitu c come inour hearts as we talk ofit to
each other going “ home along ” from the
s
daily walk which brings a fresh excitement
eve ' day in this early time.
T ose spring weeks were a true revelation of
English by-ways to the writer who sped swiftly
past field and copse and hedge-row on the silent
t es, and drank inmore beauty of English lanes
t an many years might have brought with slow
feet as the only kind of pony. 'Look at that
great pool with the thickly growing white
-water-flowers. > That is scattered star-wort,
and what a whiteness “such as no fuller on
earth can whiten it,” it spreads under the dark
hedge.‘ The marsh-marigolds and the cool
-primroses look so happy in these by-ways,
where the children from the old thatched
cottages and farms seem to have learned too
much‘ “behaviour” in the village school to
‘tear, them’ roughly up and strew them to
wither as they do near the towns. That early
winter Cress has such :1 milky blossom that you
- can see its tiny flowers as you skim along, and
V wonder at the long green needles that shoot far
’ above its head and guard it like a stalwart body-
guard.‘ The u per hedges are still leafless,
but the blackt orn is hanging bridal wreaths
for some lialf-mortal marriage among the
black branches. No wonder that Tennyson’s
“ May Queen ” grieved to think that she would
- V . “Never see
The blossom on the blackthorn, the leaf
upon the tree.”
“’heii green is only breathed like a breath
here and there the blackthorn breaks forth
and has a timid look about its transparent
whiteness. It recalls bridals as does the later
thick sweet may with its goodly scent, but the
may tells of settled comfort as.in Frith’s
“Village lVetlding,” and the blackthorn of
-some daring marriage between mortal and
immortal, some “Margaret” who had to
depart anon to “ the little grey church by the
windy shore," and leave behind “the red-gold
throne in the heart of the sea.” In the north
they tell you of “. the blackthorn winter,” and
truly it brings the cold with it and speaks of
love among the thorns. -
There is a strong fascination about the
hardy flowers that venture out with no leaves
to mother them. Hardy as they are, they are
an ethereal tribe and have all the confidence
of fine natures. TVhile the garden is still
bare enough but for crocus and aconite, the
mezereon with its flower of downy pink bursts '
into blossom. You cannot tire of looking at
it, but come nearer and srriellits unearthly
fragrance. I wonder what the ‘materialists
make of it. “There is no sense more akin to
the soul than the sense of smell,” Macdonnld
said,’ and indeed as I drink in the scent of the A
mezereon, I feel that what we know is the
least part of what there is to know, that
“Ages past the soul existed,
Here an age is resting merely V
And hence fleets again for ages.”
. In spite of the sweetness you feel that the
little rosy cups are stubhom growths that
cannot be easily quclled. A few weeks later
while the flowers are still fresh, the tiniest
spikes of green leaves break at the tips of the
branches, and the whole has the effect of
delicate Battersea enamel that XVatteau or
Bpucher would surely have loved to paint.
1N0 wonder that Christina Rossetti sings-
“lfl might see another spring
, I d not plant summer flowers and wait:
Id have my crocuses at once '
My leafless pink mezercons, ,
My chill-veined snow-drops, ehoiccr yet
My white or azure violet,
Leaf-nested primrose; an thing
To blow at once, not ate.
..,-.-....,.,.....,... .-.-.,,..,,,..,.,.,.,.,,...f V ..
