116 NATURE AND THE POETS. 



is American ; one can almost see the waiting, ru- 

 minating cows slowly stir at the signal, and start for 

 home in anticipation of the summons. Every sum- 

 mer day, as the sun is shading the hills, the clatter 

 of those pasture-bars is heard throughout the length 

 and breadth of the land. 



" Snow-Bound " is the most faithful picture of our 

 Northern winter that has yet been put into poetry. 

 What an exact description is this of the morning 

 after the storm : 



** We looked upon a world unknown, 

 On nothing we could call our own. 

 Around the glistening wonder bent 

 The blue walls of the firmament, 

 No cloud above, no earth below, 

 A universe of sky and snow." 



In his little poem on the May-flower, Mr. Sted- 

 man catches and puts in a single line a feature of our 

 landscape in spring that I have never before seen 

 alluded to in poetry. I refer to the second line of 

 this stanza : 



" Fresh blows the breeze through hemlock trees, 



The fields are edged with green below, 

 And naught but youth, and hope, and love 

 We know or care to know.'* 



It is characteristic of our Northern and New Eng- 

 land fields that they are " edged with green " in 

 spring long before the emerald tint has entirely over- 

 epre%d them. Along the fences, especially along the 

 Btorie walls, the grass starts early ; the land is fattei 

 there from the deeper snows and from other causes 



