Retired Leisure, that in trim gardens takes his pleasure*** 



MILTON. 



PROEM 



The slender osier 



By the grey stream 

 Groweth still rosier, 



While in a dream 

 Sleep the silent New- Year days, 

 By forsaken woodland ways. 



Each day a glad thrush sings 



More strong and sweet ; 

 Songs that only Spring's 



Listening ears greet. 

 Singer of the songless ways, 

 Minstrel of the tuneless days ! 



T TNDER grey branches endless tokens are given that the 

 ^ New Year has commenced. With the dawning of 

 January a new life seems to be diffused into the Garden. 

 One hardly deems it possible when walking under grey 

 boughs, wet with mist, that these same desolate paths will 

 ere long be clothed with Spring's glowing garment of green, 

 on which will be seen the most delicate delineations, and 

 all the world glad with the joy of flowers. The sunlight 

 bestowed at intervals on the passing days search out and 

 show many a promise ; here a thick carpet of emerald 

 cleaver-seedlings, more perfectly formed than any geometrical 

 star, tell of the long trail of threaded whorls of leaves that 

 love to clasp the hawthorn blossoms; it shows you the 

 glossy leaf-buds of the chestnut (its secret carefully hidden 

 of a perfectly-formed pyramid of flower-buds) that grow more 

 bright and glossy each time the sun shines out on them. 



