Jfiotes jof Strarmer, 



' As shadowy April's suns and showers would pass, 



And summer's wild profusion plenteous grew, 

 Hiding the spring flowers in long weeds and grass, 



What meads and copses would I wander through ! 

 When on the water ope'd the lily-buds, 



And fine long purples shadowed in the lake ! 

 When purple bugles peepdd in the woods 



'Neath darkest shades that boughs and leaves could make. 



' The ragged-robins by the spinney lake, 



And flag-flower bunches deeper down the flood, 

 And snugly hiding 'neath a feather'd brake, 



Full many a blue-bell flower and cuckoo-bud ; 

 And old-man's-beard, that wreathed along the hedge 



Its oddly rude, misshapen, tawny flowers, 

 And pricHy burs that crowd the leaves of sedge, 



Have claimed my pleasing search for hours and hours." 



A 



S eoon as the oak-leaves have burst their ruddy 

 sheatha and flutter their pale green pennants in 



