SPRING JOTTIxNGS 159 



One's journal daslied oif witliout any secondary 

 motive may often preserve and renew the past 

 for him in this way. 



These leaves from my own journal are not 

 very good samples of tliis sort of thing, but 

 they preserve for me the image of many a day 

 which memory alone could never have kept 



March 3, 1879. The sun is getting strong, 

 but wmter still holds his own. No hint of 

 spring in the earth or air. No sparrow or spar- 

 row song yet. But on the 5th there was a hint 

 of spring. The day warm and the snow melt- 

 ing. The first bluebird note this morning. 

 How sweetly it dropped down from the blue 

 overhead ! 



March 10. A real spring day at last, and a 

 rouser! Thermometer between 50° and 60° in 

 the coolest spot; bees very lively about the 

 hive and working on the sawdust in the wood 

 yard; how they dig and wallow in the woody 

 meal, apparently squeezing it as if forcing it to 

 yield up something to them! Here they get 

 their first substitute for pollen. The sawdust 

 of hickory and maple is preferred. The inner 

 milky substance between the bark and the wood, 

 called the cambium layer, is probably the source 

 of their supplies. 



In the growing tree it is in this layer or se- 

 cretion that the vital processes are the most 

 active and potent. It has been found by experi- 

 ment that this tender, milky substance is capable 

 of exerting a very great force ; a growing tree 

 exerts a lifting and jiushing force of more than 



