March 
sive marble pillars sustained a roof elaborate 
with richest traceries. 
‘* How calm, how solemn, how sublime the scene!” 
For the nonce it was veritably nature’s tem- 
ple. No wealth of vegetation could equal the 
cold grandeur of the display which in a brief 
hour melted away as silently as it came, but 
left an impression as abiding as it was unique. 
9 
My diary for March 2d mentions the finding 
of three robins in fine plumage, and at this sea- 
son a little life and a little bright color go a 
great way. A few days after comes the longer 
record of chickadees, nuthatches, white-throats, 
cardinals, a flicker, a downy woodpecker (its 
crimson patch showing it to be the male), a 
European goldfinch in song, and the crossbills. 
9 
Spring—the rosy promise of an unknown 
year—is clearly in the air! The quiet of win- 
ter’s low-tide is at an end. One has no longer 
to strengthen suspicion with imagination. The 
song sparrow, that faithful harbinger, is pro- 
claiming the vernal fact on every side in its 
77 
