14 WINTER SUNSHINE. 



storm-clouds as it were, the veins and ore-beds of it ? 

 I imagine it is equally abundant in winter, and more 

 equable and better tempered. Who ever breasted 

 a snow-storm without being excited and exhilarated, 

 as if this meteor had come charged with latent auroras 

 of the North, as doubtless it has ? It is like being 

 pelted with sparks from a battery. Behold the frost- 

 work on the pane the wild, fantastic limnings and 

 etchings, can there be any doubt but this subtle 

 agent has been here ? Where is it not ? It is the 

 life of the crystal, the architect of the flake, the fire 

 of the frost, the soul of the sunbeam. This crisp 

 winter air is full of it. When I come in at night 

 after an all day tramp I am charged like a Leyden 

 jar, my hair crackles and snaps beneath the comb 

 like a cat's back, and a strange, new glow diffuses it- 

 self through my system. 



It is a spur that one feels at this season more than 

 at any other. How nimbly you step forth ! The 

 woods roar, the waters shine, and the hills look in- 

 vitingly near. You do not miss the flowers and the 

 songsters, or wish the trees or the fields any different, 

 or heavens any nearer. Every object pleases. A 

 rail fence, running athwart the hills, now in sunshine 

 and now in shadow how the eye lingers upon it ! 

 Or the straight, light-gray trunks of the trees, where 

 the woods have recently been laid open by a road or 

 a clearing, how curious they look, and as if surprised 

 in undress. Next year they will begin to shoot out 

 branches and make themselves a screen. Or the 



