A Sabbath in the Open 21 



A Sabbath in the Open 



IT was a good Sabbath that was kept in the 

 fields and woods ; a good Sunday, too, full 

 of spring hope and heart, and as one stood 

 on the brow of a brown hill, and saw the oaks and 

 apples and maples suddenly alive with bluebirds 

 and robins, with now and then a sparrow, not to 

 mention woodpeckers, coming in on the south 

 west wind, and heard the exquisite warble of the 

 bluebird from every tree, there stirred in the 

 heart that thrilling pleasure that is almost as 

 poignant as pain, so keen and sudden and serious 

 is its appeal to the hidden life, that reveals itself 

 so reticently and with such hesitations and with 

 drawals throughout the long wintry season. 

 Here then sounds the emphatic call of Nature : 

 Mistake not ; the moment arrives, the harbingers 

 are at hand ; my most unselfish child, spring, 

 is busy with the marsh cabbage and busy with 

 the hepatica buds ; out again creep the willow 

 pussies that had retired while February froze the 

 air ; again swell the poplar and the hazel and alder 



