laugh ' a good while back, now : his ' laughter * 

 has already whirled the flute-notes of Spring, 

 amid branches swelling to leaf-break, but not 

 yet at the greening. The Chiff-Chaff has been 

 heard on many a common, or on the ridge of 

 a stone-dyke, or calling from the blackthorn 

 thickets. The Wheatear has by this time 

 delighted many a superstitious yokel who has 

 caught his first glimpse of it sitting on a 

 grassy tuft, or on a low spray of gorse or 

 juniper, or depressed him sorely if he has 

 come upon it for the first time when seen 

 perched on a stone. But all three are birds 

 which are with us long before the real Spring 

 is come. With the missel-thrush on the elm- 

 bole, the song-thrush in the copses, the black- 

 bird calling from the evergreens, it does not 

 follow, alas! that, as in the fairy-tale, the 

 north wind has become a feeble old man and 

 the east wind a silly old wife. Frost and 

 snow and sleet, rain and flood, and the dull 

 greyness of returned winter, may only too 

 likely succeed these blithe heralds, have so 

 succeeded, this year, as we know to our 

 cost. There was jubilation in some places 

 at January -end because of the early singing 

 of the larks, which here and there had been 

 heard soon after the New Year ; but those 

 who rejoiced untimely at the advent of spring- 

 88 



