58 THE CHRISTIAN NATURALIST. 



MAY. 



SPRING. 



* The Spring is here — the delicate footed May, 

 With its slight fingers full of leaves and flowers, 

 And with it comes a thirst to be away, 



Wasting in wood-paths its voluptuous hours — 

 A feeling that is like a sense of wings, 

 Restless to soar above these perishing things/ 



*' Lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone ; 

 the flowers appear on the earth ; the time of the sing- 

 ing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is 

 heard in our land !" So sung Solomon, in the lovely 

 land of Judea, a thousand years before the Christian 

 aera. But Spring has been a season delightful in all 

 ages and climates; though in none perhaps more so 

 than in the British islands. Willingly therefore may 

 the Church listen to the royal Poet, as if Christ himself 

 were addressing her in the gospel language of pure 

 aflfection, *' Arise, my love, my fair one, and come 

 away." To this call the Christian Naturalist would 



