216 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



dreary spectacle of barren branches, and the great elms 

 gaunt against the sky. After that the hedges gradually 

 filled with leaf, and were fully coloured when the turtle- 

 dove began to sing, but still the elms were only just bud- 

 ding, and but faintly tinted with green. 



Chaucer was right in singing of the ' floures ' of May 

 notwithstanding the northern winds and early frosts and 

 December-like character of our Mays. That the cycle 

 of weather was warmer in his time is probably true, but 

 still even now, under all the drawbacks of a late and 

 wvintry season, his description is perfectly accurate. It 

 any one had gone round the fields on old May-day, the 

 13th, his May-day, they might have found the deep blue 

 bird's-eye veronica, anemones, star-like stitchworts, cow- 

 slips, buttercups, lesser celandine, daisies, white blackthorn, 

 and gorse in bloom — in short, a list enough to make a 

 page bright with colour, though the wind might be 

 bitter. In the coldest and most exposed place I ever 

 lived in, and with a spring as cold as this, the May gar- 

 lands included orchids, and the meadows were perfectly 

 golden with marsh-marigolds. For some reason or 

 other the flowers seem to come as near as they can to 

 their time, let the weather be as hard as it may. They 

 are more regular than the migrant birds, and much more 

 so than the trees. The elm, oak, and ash appear to wait 

 a great deal on the sun and the atmosphere, and their 

 boughs give much better indications of what the weather 

 has really been than birds and flowers. The migrant 

 birds try their hardest to keep time, and some of them 

 arrive a week or more before they are noticed. Elm, 

 oak, and ash are the surest indicators ; the horse-chest- 

 nut is very apt to put forth its broad succulent leaves too 

 soon ; the sycamore, too, is an early tree in spite of 

 everything. It has been said that of late years we have 



