April Play of L ight and Shadow. i o i 



XXI. 



April Play of Light and Shadow Genuine April Weather Hills 

 in April Weather The Willow in April Streams in April Con- 

 stable His observation about Clouds His Affection for the 

 Spring-time Chaucer His wonderful -Passion for Landscape 

 His description of Spring The Draba Verna Figwort Ranun- 

 culus Wordsworth's Poem on the Little Celandine Buttercups 

 The Lesser Celandine in Decay Unresisting nature of Decay 

 in Plants Resistance to Decay in Men Beautiful Association of 

 the name Celandine. 



IT happened that the month of April opened with 

 April's own characteristic weather. March had 

 ended with a gray sky through which sunshine filtered, 

 as it were, in a way much more trying to the strongest 

 eyesight than the intensest glare of summer. All Nature 

 was a picture of the most various and delicate grays, with 

 fresh green sparingly scattered ; a sort of coloring quite 

 peculiar to the season and full of a quiet charm, when 

 we are in a mood quiet enough to enjoy it. But the 

 first of April brought with it a perfect revolution. 

 Instead of the almost uniform gray sky, broken only by 

 gleams of semi-transparence in the universal cloud- 

 canopy, we had now separate clouds, having a magnifi- 

 cent individuality, and sunshine in perfect though tem- 

 porary splendor. No weather is, to my feeling, so 

 delightful as this genuine April weather. The play of 

 light and shadow, so rapid in its transitions, so powerful 



