CLIMATE. 15 



10, but now and then in the night the mercury would fall 

 as low as 16 0. 



In the middle of February, when we were filling our ice 

 houses, I measured the ice in our lake twenty inches thick, 

 and the frost in the ground on March 10th was nearly two 

 feet. The ice rarely gets much thicker when it is once 

 covered with a pretty deep coating of snow. 



The winter landscape in the forest district, especially 

 when seen from a distance, is often very pretty, the dark 

 foliage of the pines standing out in bold relief from the white 

 covering of snow which surrounds them. It is, however, 

 when the beech trees burst suddenly into leaf in the early 

 summer that the beauty of this country is really at its height. 

 I suppose that it is owing to its contrast with the cheerless 

 monotony of the wintry landscape, but it is certain that no 

 one except the man who has passed a winter in the north can 

 form the least idea of the glad and joyous feelings with which 

 summer is hailed by the inhabitants of these northern climes. 



Sudden as is the change in autumn, when the biting 

 east wind comes howling over the dreary waste of Siberia, and 

 the landscape is buried beneath the snow drift, it is no less 

 sudden when the mild west wind of May comes with healing 

 on its wings and the summer migrants appear as the glad 

 harbingers of spring. A few dull misty days with warm wind 

 and rain, and the whole face of the country changes as if by 

 magic. The green rye appears as the snow rapidly melts 

 away, the first bea sippa or wood anemone (which is here 

 hailed with as much delight as the little violet at home) raises 

 its innocent head on some sheltered woodland bank. The 

 trees burst suddenly into leaf, and no one who had seen the 

 country a little while before could believe that so much beauty 

 lay hidden beneath the waste of snow. Now all again is activity 

 and bustle out of doors ; animal as well as vegetable life all at 

 once wake up from their winter slumber, and for six months 

 the farmer, sportsman, and naturalist have not a day to spare. 



When I first see the little white wagtail, I know that 

 spring is not far off, and in the south this is the sign for the 

 farmer to commence ploughing. We are sure, however, to 



