74 Walks in New England 



When there comes the silent token 

 Of an April day 

 Blue hepatica ! &quot; 



While thus the summer forerunners appear, 

 proclaiming the message of blossom and growth in 

 the still open woodland and on sunny knolls, see 

 also the willows in flower, the catkins grown dusty 

 with pollen, see the poplars shaking their tas 

 sels, and the alders and birches and hazels. Now, 

 too, the adder-tongue lily is showing its yellow 

 bells at the edges of sunny woodland, and along 

 the moist banks of meadows. The ferns are un 

 coiling their fronds, the crosiers of the bishop s 

 fern are lifting in benediction over those that shall 

 follow. The leatherwood s golden tassels are 

 lighting the woods with their echoed sunshine, 

 and the buds of the spice bush and hobble-bush 

 are betraying their intentions. A hundred shrubs 

 are swelling their leaf buds and flower buds, and 

 all things are telling of life. All the while, over 

 these growths, the birds are warbling, and scold 

 ing, and the sunshine and showers are making 

 earth over. The sheaths of the elm buds are 

 loosening and the elms grow gold-brown over 

 head ; and what ! can it be that the ruddy sweet 

 florets of red maple are opening? Even so, and 

 beneath at the wood s edge the bloodroot s white 

 calyx spreads purely like a dream of virtue un- 



