II 



MARCH DAYS 



BACK and forth across the land, in 

 swift and sudden alternation, the March 

 winds toss days of bitter cold and days of 

 genial warmth, now out of the eternal 

 winter of the north, now from the endless 

 summer of the tropics. 



Repeated thawing and freezing has 

 given the snow a coarse grain. It is like 

 a mass of fine hailstones and with no 

 hint of the soft and feathery flakes that 

 wavered down like white blossoms shed 

 from the unseen bloom of some far-off 

 upper world and that silently transformed 

 the unseemliness of the black and tawny 

 earth into the beauty of immaculate pur- 

 ity. 



One day, when the wind breathes from 

 the south a continuous breath of warmth, 

 your feet sink into this later coarseness 

 come of its base earthly association, with 

 a grinding slump, as in loose wet sand, so 

 S 



