My Garden in Spring 



early lilac Crocuses have the outer surface of the exterior 

 segments coloured buff, as in Crocus Imperati and C. etruscus, 

 or of a neutral grey shade, as in C. Tomasinianus, while 

 others are striped or freckled with browns and purples in 

 a manner that renders them very hard to see among 

 their own leaves or grass in the case of stripes, or against 

 bare ground on a dull day or when closed for the night 

 if suffused externally. A spell of sunshine changes this 

 in a few minutes, and the glowing interior of the flower 

 shows up from afar, and is ready for fertilisation by any 

 insect visitor which may be rendered active and hungry 

 by the same bright spell. I have been unable to discover 

 what are the enemies of such flowers in their own homes, 

 but judging from the evil habits of that vulgar little pest 

 the sparrow, one is inclined to fancy they may be birds 

 of sorts. But for the sake of those to whose charitable 

 sentimentality all members of the avian fauna are the " dear 

 little birds," repaying winter doles of crumbs with spring 

 carols, I will offer a scapegoat in the form of some 

 beetle of the family of Cantharidae such as our British 

 Oil Beetle, Meloe Proscarabaeus, to which a fresh young 

 flower is a toothsome breakfast, for I notice that those 

 who can overlook anything in a bird " a dear little bird" 

 of course, ostriches and eagles being outside their 

 spheres of experience are ever ready to denounce or 

 bring about the destruction of nasty creeping things." 

 For myself, I am too light a sleeper to appreciate the 

 cheeping of newly-awakened sparrows in the Wistaria 

 round my window, and too fond of its flowers to forgive 

 their chewing the swelling bloombuds. 

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