170 SIGNS AND SEASONS 



the hepatica, which I found on April 4. The arbu- 

 tus and the dicentra appeared on the 10th, and 

 the coltsfoot which, however, is an importation 

 about the same time. The bloodroot, claytonia, 

 saxifrage, and anemone were in bloom on the 17th, 

 and I found the first blue violet and the great 

 spurred violet on the 19th (saw the little violet- 

 colored butterfly dancing about the woods the same 

 day). I plucked my first dandelion on a meadow 

 slope on the 23d, and in the woods, protected by a 

 high ledge, my first trillium. During the month 

 at least twenty native shrubs and wild flowers 

 bloomed in my vicinity, which is an unusual show- 

 ing for April. 



There are many things left for May, but nothing 

 fairer, if as fair, as the first flower, the hepatica. 

 I find I have never admired this little firstling half 

 enough. When at the maturity of its charms, it 

 is certainly the gem of the woods. What an indi- 

 viduality it has! No two clusters alike; all shades 

 and sizes; some are snow-white, some pale pink, 

 with just a tinge of violet, some deep purple, others 

 the purest blue, others blue touched with lilac. A 

 solitary blue-purple one, fully expanded and rising 

 over the brown leaves or the green moss, its cluster 

 of minute anthers showing like a group of pale stars 

 on its little firmament, is enough to arrest and hold 

 the dullest eye. Then, as I have elsewhere stated, 

 there are individual hepaticas, or individual fami- 

 lies among them, that are sweet-scented. The gift 

 seems as capricious as the gift of genius in families. 



