64 FEERUAKV. 



in accordance with our ideas of home-comfort and 

 elegance. If we are to believe travellers, in no 

 country is the domestic culture of flowers so much 

 attended to as in this. I trust this will always be a 

 prevailing taste with us. There is something pure 

 and refreshing in the appearance of plants in a room; 

 and watched and waited on, as they are generally, 

 by the gentler sex, they are links in many pleasant 

 associations. They are the cherished favourites of 

 our mothers, wives, sisters, and friends not less 

 dear ; and connect themselves in our mind with 

 their feminine delicacy, loveliness, and affectionate 

 habits and sentiments. 



February is so called from the Roman custom of 

 burning expiatory sacrifices, Februalia : the Saxons 

 called it Sprout-kele, because the kale, or cabbage, 

 began to sprout; and also Sol-monath, or pancake- 

 month, because cakes were offered to the sun. 



Various signs of returning spring occur at dif- 

 ferent times in February. The wood-lark, one of 

 our earliest and sweetest songsters, often begins his 

 note at the very entrance of the month. The thrush 

 now commences his song, and tomtits are seen 

 hanging on the eaves of barns and thatched out- 

 houses, particularly if the weather be snowy and 

 severe. Rooks now revisit their breeding-trees, 

 and arrange the stations of their future nests. The 

 harsh, loud voice of the missel-thrush is now heard 

 towards the end of the month ; and, if the weather 



