THE SEA IN A SNOWSTORM. 



FEBRUARY came in under the guise of May. 

 The sky of Sunday, the first, was wonderfully 

 blue ; its 'air mild, often more than mild ; its 

 clouds were like the pictures in my old physical 

 geography. I could almost see the mystic words 

 cirrus, cumulus, stratus, written in the heavens. 

 Tempted by the mock spring I extended my 

 walk beyond its usual limits, infringed on Lex- 

 ington, and from the heights of Waverley sur- 

 veyed miles of glistening hillsides to the north 

 and west, and crowded cities to the south and 

 east. Every hollow was a pool, and every gla- 

 cial furrow in the hills a brook. The cabbages 

 were reasserting their rights to the farmlands 

 and the air appurtenant thereto. 



The birds revelled in the warm sunshine, fly- 

 Ing for the love of flying, and calling loudly to 

 each other for the sake of calling. The crows 

 spoke loudest and the chickadees most often. On 

 a sunny bank a large flock of goldfinches were 

 feeding among the weeds and grasses. I counted 

 fifty of them, and several flew away before the 

 census was finished. They were singing enough 



