A LABRADOR SPRING 



three or four yards more, the ripening berries 

 of autumn could be found. Here was no 

 need of long journeys to pass from winter to 

 summer, nor of long tarrying in one place for 

 the seasons to pass. The melting snow-drift, 

 the brief spring and the short arctic summer 

 condensed all the seasons in space and time. 



Spring is a long process in New England. 

 From the first appearance of the blue-bird 

 and skunk cabbage in early March or even 

 in late February, to the departure of the last 

 black-poll warbler for the north and the falling 

 of the apple blossoms in early June, spring 

 dallies along the way for over three months. 

 Not only does spring dally in this temperate 

 region, but, in its early progress, it sustains 

 frequent interruptions eruptions one might 

 call them if that hot word can be used in a 

 cold sense of winter. 



I have always longed to watch the arrival 

 of spring in the country, but to absent oneself 

 from one's duties for over three months is 

 plainly out of the question. The northern 

 spring, however, has its advantages in these 

 hustling times; it is a hustler itself. The 

 change from mid-winter to mid-summer is so 



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