100 SPRING. 



be the harbinger of the spring, or the bringer of an ac- 

 cession of winter. At such places, all winds come in 

 gusts ; but the wind of winter wails alone, as it were. 

 There is no resonance, and every gust comes with a 

 grating thump, as if a tree were uprooted, or a hillock 

 overturned. The windows rattle and shake, but they 

 have no sympathy with the under tones of the gale. 

 But the gale of spring is very different ; and nothing 

 is more delightful than to hear it before daylight, on a 

 morning early in the year. There are generally some 

 signs of its coming, though they often pass unheeded. 

 The clouds that surround the setting sun are higher, 

 more fantastically shaded, and tinted with richer colors ; 

 and the heavy lump of clouds which is seen in the 

 east when there is to be a snow storm, is not found : 

 in its place there are light streaks of the same cloud 

 by which the sun is surrounded, and which fade from 

 golden orange, through all the tints, to the russet and 

 the grey, as they recede from that luminary ; and one 

 may often trace a sort of polarity in streaks of light 

 cirrhi, higher up. Just about sunset, there are light 

 gusts from the east and the west, as if the wind were 

 " trying for a point," and such is the fact ; the cur- 

 rents from the north and south, or from the mountain 

 and the plain, or sea, as it happens, have come in con- 

 tact in the great mass of the atmosphere, and thus 

 loosed the little winds that play upon the surface of 

 the earth. Momentary as is their duration, and feeble 

 as are their gusts, those little winds are well worthy the 

 attention of every one who aspires to be a naturalist. 

 They are, perhaps, the most certain indications that 

 we know, of changes of weather, either in respect to 

 moisture or temperature. The more completely that 



