THE GARTER-SNAKE 



and there the tawny mat beneath is up- 

 lifted by the struggling plant life below 

 it or pierced through by an underthrust 

 of a sprouting seed. There is a prom- 

 ise of bloom in blushing arbutus buds, 

 a promise even now fulfilled by the first 

 squirrelcups just out of their furry bracts 

 and already calling the bees abroad. 

 Flies are buzzing to and fro in busy 

 idleness, and a cricket stirs the leaves 

 with a sudden spasm of movement. The 

 first of the seventeen butterflies that shall 

 give boys the freedom of bare feet goes 

 wavering past like a drifting blossom. 



A cradle knoll invites you to a seat on 

 the soft, warm cushion of dead leaves 

 and living moss and purple sprigs of 

 wintergreen with their blobs of scarlet 

 berries, which have grown redder and 

 plumper under every snow of the winter. 

 This smoothly rounded mound and the 

 hollow scooped beside it, brimful now of 

 amber, sun-warmed water, mark the an- 

 cient place of a great tree that was dead 

 and buried, and all traces by which its 

 kind could be identified were mouldered 

 away and obliterated, before you were 

 born. 



44 



